Children Turn to Summer Cricket Coaching Camps During Vacation
VIJAYAWADA: Dressed in standard white, around 120 children descend on the Makineni Basavapunnaiah stadium at Ajit Singh Nagar here before the break of dawn. They unload their kits from the back of their shoulders, relax a bit and start learning the ropes of cricket.
The summer cricket coaching camp at the MB stadium, one of the three sub-centres of the Andhra Cricket Association (ACA) here, is a beehive activity during the summer vacation. With the sun up, the children enrolled for the summer cricket camp start practising their batting shots, bowling run-ups, fielding drills.
The ACA is organising summer coaching camps for students at the Indira Gandhi Municipal Corporation (IGMC) stadium, the MB stadium and the Siddhartha Medical College grounds. These act as a good platform for children to learn and showcase their skills in cricket.
Tapping his bat on the ground without taking his eye off the bowler, Ishan plays a proper front-foot defensive shot. The 8-year-old kid says, “My coach has taught me how to play a defence shot on the front foot, which is the basic trait of any batsman aiming to block the ball. This keeps the batsman in control and confident while facing a bowler.”
Another student, Burhan, says: “The past three weeks at the summer camp have been quite a learning curve for me. I got to learn front and back foot defence shots and play a full-strength cricket team match.”
“The kids turn up enthusiastically at daybreak. Many in the camp aspire to represent the Indian cricket team and emulate their favourite cricketing heroes' batting stance and bowling actions,” ACA coach K. Srinivas said.
Srinivas said these summer camps helped ACA and the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) identify young cricketing talents at a tender age, train them and enable them to represent national and international cricket.
The best cricketing talents identified at the camp will be provided regular training later and promoted to play zonal, district and state-level competitions, he said.
