From premier to president for Morris Iemma

Since taking over the Kingsgrove presidency in 2012, Iemma has tripled the size of the club by using the strategies he employed to lead Labor to victory in 2007: continuous campaigning, retaining voters, recruiting new voters and targeting untapped and emerging communities.

His four children play the sport. Daughter Clara plays first grade for Campbelltown-Camden and has been a member of the NSW under-18s for the past three years while sons Matthew, Joshua and Luca are also talented with the leather and willow.

And Iemma has enjoyed success on the coaching front, labelling his unbeaten run to Moore Shield success two years ago with the under-14s St George representative team, "as big a thrill as winning the election".

"There is so much of the basic election campaigning and political skills that are applicable to sport administration and cricket recruitment," Iemma said. "The club [Kingsgrove] was stagnant. We weren't growing, we were down to about seven or eight junior teams ... officials were decrying that the golden years had gone by and that's a thing I refused to accept.

"We instituted some strategies to retain the players and families we had, i.e. keep the voters that are voting for you.

"We delivered some strategies to spread our message far and wide to get as many people as possible – target new voters, new families, new players.

"We targeted new and emerging communities from non-English speaking backgrounds who happened to also be passionate about cricket.

"Continued recruitment, just like in politics continuous campaigning. It was a phrase that first came to light in the late 80s, early 90s."

Iemma's strategy of going into schools worked. The juniors now number close to 300 and each season Kingsgrove runs up to 20 summer teams, along with a handful of winter outfits.

There's also been a marked increase in the number of volunteers helping at junior cricket, 22 of whom the club has put through a coaching course.

"With that growth the club also becomes financially sustainable; each year if you've got more teams and more players than your registration revenues increase," Iemma said.

"Your costs increase but if your registration fees are aimed at recovering your costs plus a small margin then your club is financially sustainable."

Underpinning Iemma's role at Kingsgrove is a deep passion for cricket, moulded from hours spent standing on the concourse at the SCG in the steaming heat watching Dennis Lillee and Jeff Thomson go up against England and the West Indies.

He boasts a huge collection of Ashes videos and DVDs and was there when they flicked the lights on for the first time at the SCG.

But it's his passion for expanding junior cricket that drives him now.

"All of the party secretaries and campaign people would impress upon backbench MPs that were in marginal seats that continuous campaigning is the secret, I deployed that when I was in parliament ... and so I do that with cricket," Iemma said.

"My club recruits year-round, not just in the two or three weeks before the season starts."