January 30, 2013 at 5:54 p.m.
Girls to play in boys' league
About 14 girls showed up two Saturdays ago as the Bermuda Cricket Board looks to develop its women's programme.
Earlier this year, the women's national team played in a World Cup Qualifier in South Africa. The squad was made up of mostly women in their 30s and 40s.
The one exception was 15-year-old pace bowler Reuna Richardson, who earlier this week won the Minister's Award for women's cricket.
The board is hoping to get a few more young girls involved to build upon what has been a bare bones programme.
"It was amazing how fast the girls caught on, Manders said. "There was a lot of natural talent."
Manders admitted they had hoped for more girls to turn out but "it was Palm Sunday and a lot of people were involved in the walk. We are going to plan another one sometime soon and we'll get a better response. We're just looking at the best date to have it."
He said in general, he thought the girls enjoyed themselves and they improved from the beginning of training to the end.
"You could see the enthusiasm," Manders said.
He added: "If we want to have a decent and strong women's team, then its important that we have a good youth programme - for males and females. That's why Bermuda cricket is the way it is now because the board some time ago only had a vision of competing at the senior level but they forgot we needed youngsters coming through to fill in.
"So we're at that little void where we didn't have a youth league."
He said the grassroots programme has been established and now the focus is on making sure the youth are being coached properly.
He said there will not be a girls' league this season, but there will be girls' teams.
"The under-14 girls will play in the boys Under-11 League and the Under-16s will play in the Under-14 League until we can get it off the ground and have four or five girls' teams. We just want to improve it every year.
"We have to make it aware that cricket is for girls also," Manders said. "The girls that showed up on that Sunday thoroughly enjoyed themselves.
"If we can get a youth programme together, we can be a force in this (Americas) region. We just have to catch them young."
He said right now girls don't play any cricket in the schools and the BCB is planning on doing an 8's Tournament in the primary and middle schools and maybe even in the senior schools.[[In-content Ad]]
Comments:
You must login to comment.