FORMER Barbados all-rounder Franklyn Stephenson believes young cricketers should be focusing on the longer version of the game.
“Under-17 T20 cricket isn’t a big development tool right now for our youngsters. These youngsters need to play a longer version of the game because we don’t play that much in a sense,” said Stephenson in response to news that a local clubs’ Under-17 tournament was coming on stream. Our Under-11’s go to England and play 45-over cricket.
We have short daylight hours here in Barbados and so even when we play 35 overs, the majority of the time we only get 28 in on a regular basis. We are actually playing a very short form of cricket already so if we shorten that I don’t think it’s very developmental for the kids,” said the founder of the Franklyn Stephenson Cricket Academy.
Stephenson recently launched the Community Cricket League Under-16 Tournament to follow on from the Barbados Cricket Supplies (BCS) Under-13 Tournament which has been in existence for the past three years under the new sponsors.
He told WEEKENDSPORT cricketers in the Caribbean have proved they can play good cricket while taking on the shorter version of the game, so he wanted the tournament to have a version which was longer and would act as good practice for Test cricket. (RG)
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