Photo © ECC

Level III French coach David Bordes recently ran two highly successful introductory courses in the Aquitaine region. The first course, in Saint Aulaye (23-25 April) enjoyed perfect weather, hot and sunny, which allowed the group to take to the field each afternoon, and use the gym in the morning. Each session lasted roughly 2 hours, with the participating youngsters (approximately one quarter of whom had played cricket before) really showing their quality. All were very motivated, and hope to continue playing, with their parents asking about the youth coaching timetable at Saint Aulaye CC.

The weather was a little less clement for the second course, in Roaillan, 26 April, with a lot of cloud and low temperatures, however the rain held off and the group managed to get outside. 26 participants from two local leisure centres attended, although numbers were depleted by many families deciding to head for the coast in view of the previous good weather, and by a third leisure centre dropping out. David employed some of the tactics which he had seen Cricketec's Bruce and Mike use during the roadshow's visit to France earlier in the month, and the participating youngsters, aged 6-11, loved it, asking David to carry on when the session had ended, and to come back in the summer.