By Namasiku Dube
GROOTFONTEIN, May 23 – A cricket academy was recently established in the town of Grootfontein in the Otjozondjupa region as a sports development initiative.
The academy will target school children, both boys, and girls, with ages ranging from 5-to 7 years.
“The aim is to have the kids start sports at an early age to prepare them for the club level set up,” coach Boxy Dube said.
This is beneficial for young people as they are future professionals and it gives good awareness to keep kids from bad activities such as drug and alcohol abuse, Boxy said. The biggest challenge the academy faces is that all schools in Grootfontein have no suitable cricket facilities and they use rugby club premises while they look for a permanent field.
Coach Boxy said he had done a lot of work as the only cricket coach in the town and has already produced one player Edelle Van Zyl for the girls’ national team and Tjiposa Tjiposa for the national boys’ team.
Grootfontein Namspire cricket has been in operation for the past four years now. Although the town has a cricket facility, this has been abandoned for years now.
Namibia will host the Under-19 Cricket World Cup in 2027 and the academy will help raise awareness of the sport in small towns – Namibia Daily News.
