Photo © ECC

European Development Program Umpire Consultant Graham Cooper paid his second visit of the year to Vienna over the weekend 6-9 June. Having run the ECC Introductory Umpires Course and Exam in March, this visit was to perform `on- field' assessments on 3 of the umpires who had attended that weekend.

The assessments were carried out at Open League matches in Vienna ñ ACC vs Vienna CC at Concordia on the Saturday and Lords CC vs Pakistan Falken CC at Seebarn on the Sunday. With temperatures in the high 90's Graham was extremely pleased not to be out in the middle for 100 overs, although walking the boundary and keeping a close watch on the umpires was still fairly tiring.

Photo © ECC

The object of these assessments is to help the umpire in areas of field technique and to this end Graham and the 3 umpires had long after match discussions regarding this part of the job. It cannot be stressed enough that these assessments are of vital importance to any umpire ñ classroom work is all very well, but it is not until one can see how the umpire operates on the field that really useful help can be offered.

Photo © ECC

Graham was also present to witness the completion of the new scoreboard at Concordia ñ the brainchild of Walter Blaschke. Walter had started building it from scratch on the Friday and completed it by painting all the numbers on the Saturday. It was `christened' in time for use during the second innings of Saturday's game and everyone agreed that he had done a magnificent job.

Graham's third visit will take place during August where he and 11 other umpires will be operating in the ECC Trophy.