ParasMhambrey & Lance Klusener give tips to aspiringcricketers
Procam International, promoters of the Coca-Cola Cricket Cup, India’slargest inter-school cricket tournament, announced that four of their youngcricketers trained with Indian Premier League (IPL) franchisee Mumbai Indians inthe city on Thursday. Procam International had earlier announced a tie-up with HarbhajanSingh leading Mumbai Indians to nurture young cricketing talent in the city.
As part of thisassociation, four young boys, Laxman Manjrekar (IES Raje Shivaji School),Khizar Dafedar (Anjuman E Islam), and Piyush Nath & Hyder Malik (RizviSpringfield) spent time with the Mumbai Indian coaches Paras Mhambrey and the South African all-rounderLance Klusener at the Mumbai Cricket Association Ground.
The tournament has witnessed some excitingcricketing action through the nine-month tournament that targets over 11,000young cricketers from 700 schools, across 65 districts in ten states. In orderto continue discovering exciting cricketing talent from Mumbai city, MumbaiIndians partnered with the Coca-ColaCricket Cup to develop, nurture and motivate young under-16 talent atthe grassroots level.
Paras Mhambrey, Coach,Mumbai Indianssaid, “Theboys are talented and were eager to learn. Today being the first session withthem, we gave them advise on their bowling action, run-up and explained to themthe importance of fitness in the game of cricket.”
Vivek B Singh,Jt. MD, Procam International said, “It gives us immense joy andfulfillment to unearth exciting talent through the Coca-Cola Cricket Cup. Procam International has been providing a nationalplatform to young cricketers. We are glad that the Mumbai Indians spent timewith the young players today and are sure opportunities like these will givethe children a lot of confidence to play even better in the years to come.”
Khizar Dafedar fromAnjuman E Islam School said, “It feels amazing to be a part of the Coca-Cola Cricket Cup. Cricketing greats likeLance Klusener sir and Paras sir gave us some fantastic bowling and batting tipsto improve our scores and the game. I feel much more confident and am thankfulfor giving us this opportunity.”
Piyush Nath from Rizvi Springfield felt this was one of his best cricket training sessions with Paras Mhambreyand Lance Klusener. ‘’I feel so lucky to have had this opportunity to trainunder such experienced players. They are heroes and I really look up to them. Ihope someday I can make it big with a lot of hard work’’, he said.
More about theCoca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup
The Coca-Cola Intra-State Challenge was playedin Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh (all 13 districts), Punjab (sixmajor districts and 14 minor districts), Baroda, Tamil Nadu (6 districts),Jharkhand (18 districts), Uttar Pradesh (Lucknow and Kanpur) and Saurashtra.The format of the Coca-Cola Cricket Cup was structured so as to begin with theIntra-State Challenge, which was open to all schools in the respective citiesand districts..
Theprogram was open to all young cricketers born on or after 01.09.1995.Thetournament was played across 10 states in over 65 districts involving more than11,000 young players from 700 schools.
Winners of the Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup willbe awarded a cash prize of Rs.1 Lakh, while the runners-up would get Rs.70,000/-. 20 talented players selected from the Coca-Cola Inter-State Challengewill get a chance to attend a week long ‘Coaching Clinic’ under the guidance ofprominent former cricketers of the country. Post the week long coaching, thefinal Coca-Cola XI team will be selected and given an opportunity to prove theirmettle by participating in a competitive tournament against an invitedInternational U-16 team from other cricket playing nations.
At the end of the 9-month program, three bestplayers – ‘The Coca-Cola Cricket Stars’will be groomed for a period of 3 years enabling them to realize their dream ofdonning International colors. Depending on their core strength, they will alsoget an opportunity to further hone their skills by attending training campsunder the guidance of prominent former cricketers.
Coca-Cola CricketCup’s Vision
BCCI over the past several years has done atremendous job of enhancing the growth of cricket in India. They have done soby adopting a result oriented approach of organizing age group tournaments allover the country through their state associations. This has helped immensely incarving out talented individuals on a regular basis. Most of these cricketershave moved ahead and have brought laurels for their states and the country.
Seeing the vast potential and growingpopularity of this game, Coca-Cola India has a vision of facilitating BCCI intheir quest to tap talent. We believe that the future of Indian cricket lies inthese young talented budding cricketers. We intend to provide a perfectopportunity and platform to all the youngsters across the country to showcasetheir talent, skill and equally important, pride and loyalty to their school.It gives BCCI and their affiliated state units a brilliant arena to scout forpotential match winners.
We hope that this initiative will serve as anideal platform to identify and nurture young talented cricketers for them to beable to get noticed by the state associations and BCCI to represent the countryon an International level.
