Thomas Russell (aged 13) has written this article for the WCB website about his experience on a WCB summer holiday camp, and his preference for test cricket. Thank you, Thomas, for your excellent article.
On the morning of Monday 9th August 2021, I arrived at Stratford-upon-Avon Cricket Club at 10 a.m., ready for a jam-packed, joyful and jubilant day of cricket. To sum up the week in a cliché, I would say that I received that, and much, much more.
The coaches were compassionate and constructive – I learned so much in five hours! As good as one-to-one coaching followed after the temperature checks put in place to ensure everyone was safe. Every coach during the week was animated and vivacious, eager to answer any questions.
As well as this, I noticed that the standard of players was higher, allowing me to further progress my skills, but also allowing some of the older children to give recommendations to the younger, less experienced, first time hard-ball players.
I would say that the best thing of the week was how we could choose to play an “older” and “younger” game or games with mixed age-groups within the teams, or a higher standard and lower standard game. This gave the more serious cricketers a chance to experiment with their skills and the less experienced cricketers a chance to have fun.
A quick tip to any 10+ year old cricketers who might feel that they’ve progressed from playing soft-ball games in the afternoon: it actually gave me the chance to try out variations to take more wickets in hard-ball games. This has helped my leg-spin hugely.
After attending many cricket camps, I would say that I loved this one the most because we were able to play any game we voted for at the end of the day. Mine was an all-day test match for Friday – I’m a cricket purist! 🙂 In my opinion, Test Match cricket is the best because unlike shorter formats, batters have time to test out the ball and pitch, as well as trying to survive the scary first 20 overs in which (unlike shorter formats) the bowlers are nearly always on top. This is helped greatly by the use of red and pink balls that seam off the pitch and swing in the air – completely the opposite of white ball (Batter’s) cricket!
Thank You Warwickshire! Sign me up for 2022!
Thomas Russell (Test Match Tom) Age 13, Stratford-upon-Avon and Radway cricket clubs