Winter work aiming to produce summer results

GUERNSEY'S development coaches have a busy winter programme ahead as they look to build on a successful summer. The island's junior teams enjoyed a superb 2003 season with the highlights including the under-11s and under-13s being unbeaten at both Guernsey and Channel Islands level. That included wins in the Taunton and Canford festivals respectively.

Meanwhile, the under-14s were convincing winners of the inter-insular and the under-15s had the better of a draw with their Jersey counterparts.

And the successful establishment of an under-nines development squad emphasised the strides being made throughout the age groups.

But the arrival of winter does not bring cricket development to a halt as there are indoor leagues, coaching courses, the PWC School of Excellence and county trials being held right up to the start of next season.

The first of those aspects started recently with the under-11 development and under-13 junior indoor leagues running until Christmas at a new venue for cricket on the island - the Scout Hall at Rue Maingy.

'We have just had a mat donated by the Friends of Guernsey Cricket Charitable Trust to go in the hall. It allows these boys a chance to play indoor cricket,' said CICB (Guernsey) development coach Jason Shambrook.

'The indoor league is great for teaching our young players the value of running and calling between the wickets. The fielding needs to be sharp and the players need to use soft hands to play the ball into gaps.'

He has also introduced a unique bonus points scoring system in the under-13 competition where a team earns 0.01 points for every run scored up to 140 runs, and 0.2 for every wicket taken with a maximum of seven wickets being possible.

'With this points system, it means that the teams are always playing for something - every run and every wicket is worth something,' Shambrook said.

'The leagues run from now until Christmas. Alongside those leagues, we are running batting workshops for all players outside the island squads from years five to eight.

'Through that, we are trying to raise the standard of cricket on the island. Rather than just have the island squad training for when they go away, we want to bring the local league players up to the island squad's standard.

'It has been well attended and we have had six coaches there for around 20 kids.'

Shambrook's fellow coach Jeremy Frith has also been holding batting workshops for players from under-14 level and over, including those from the Sirens women's team, on Friday nights. The island all-rounder has added a unique twist to the sessions by doing drills to music.

The streamlined PWC School of Excellence is also concentrating on those with a lot of potential with the willow and the attention to detail is very impressive.

'We have started the School of Excellence with six players on it, we are just doing batting this term.

'What we have done now is set them up with their own player profile. We have assessed each player, they have their own folder and we then work on their weaknesses.

'After Christmas, the School of Excellence will have four batsmen, four bowlers and a wicketkeeper from each island squad.'

One of the School of Excellence players - Tim Ravenscroft - continues to impress beyond these shores. He will be attending West of England under -13 trials for three days at Christmas and he is still only in the under-12 age group.

And next month Alan Crouch, Wiltshire's development officer, will be coming to Guernsey to assess the players that featured for the county this year and also have at look at some others with potential.

Meanwhile, Shambrook has just begun looking for Guernsey next batch of promising cricketers.

'I am just starting schools now to work with Year 3 doing hand/eye co-ordination things. I should get to see every class in every school. That is how the under-nine development squad was started and this will bring in the next phase of players in that age group,' he said.

That will lead to more budding young cricketers being added to the database that already boasts 350 children who receive direct mail about future courses and events. They have recently been sent information about the upcoming Cricket at Christmas courses.

After the holidays, there will be more indoor leagues being run with two divisions at each age group to allow those not in or on the fringe of the island squads to get involved.

'What we are trying to do is give everyone a chance of playing at a level that befits them. They are better off playing in a league where they are happy and get a chance to shine.'