ALL-ROUND ACADEMY

Back in 2010, three boys were selected from the country to attend the Africa all-round cricket academy, held in Benoni, South Africa. Now, four Swazi boys under the age of 16 were selected for 2014 and are currently undergoing intense training at the Willowmoore Park cricket centre in Benoni.

Four years ago, Harris Rashid, Delisa Malinga and Alexander Nicole attended the academy and came back with excellent techniques and superb abilities in playing and understanding the game. With the quality of training the young men acquired from the academy, Harris has gone as far as being named the captain of the national senior team; Delisa got a call up to the senior team and, since then, has played every international game but one. However, Nicole hung up his bat in international cricket, unfortunately.

The boys under microscopic assessment and intense coaching at the academy currently are Sibongiseni Dlamini, Junior Chirwa (both from St Mark’s), Siphesihle Tsabedze and Asad Khan (both from Enjabulweni). The academy programme is aimed at equipping the countries with modern cricketing techniques and skills for the Under-19 World Cup Qualifiers, of which the main event will be in 2016.
‘All-round’ means being able to both bowl and bat exceptionally. Usually, players specialise in either one and for an excellent athlete who is able to do both successfully is considered a luxury for the team, for he or she is a two-in-one kind of a player.

They are called an all-rounder; we recall the likes of Jacques Kallis and Mohammed Hafeez in international cricket.
I mentioned intense training because in this academy you are pushed to the limit. You are trained till you drop, if it takes that, for lack of a better phrase, in  quest to build a very strong cricketer with character as well.

Fitness, batting, bowling and fielding techniques are a priority in this four-day programme. To equip the candidates, Africa Cricket hires a Level-4 coach to facilitate the proceedings, invites a nutrition specialist, a sports science expert who holds at least a Master’s in the field of other expertise and a whole lot of experts for the boys to learn a lot about the sport and their body coordination.

On the return from this phenomenal programme tomorrow, we are very certain that the boys stand a better chance to make it in any squad at any development level and if they keep their game at a high note they will become one of the best players the country has.
We hope they grasp everything thrown at them and, certainly, their peers will learn from them and we can only get better as a cricket playing nation.

Unfortunately, we could not get hold of them at the time of writing this article because they are training almost every hour during the day. We promise to hold an interview on their return and they shall share with us what went on in the academy.
For comments, please contact Delisa Malinga at 7651 1101 or send to delisabalans@gmail.com or The Sports Editor, Lwazi Dlamini, at sports@times.co.sz

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