2022 U19 World Cup Thread

[Googly]

It would be extremely disappointing if ZC paid for them to get there. There are more deserving players here. I would hope they found their own way, but not sure about accommodation etc. There was a Pakistani lad a few years back that needed to play u19 in order to shine up his CV to get into a Pakistani Academy, and of course he was selected. In the words of Samora Machel- the goat must graze where it's tethered.

There isn't even a scouting network here! You don't need one either. In a functioning system all that would need to happen is that a coach recommends a player, takes some video, sends it to one of our esteemed talent scouts and they decide whether he's worth a second look.
What is the plan here anyway? Does he get recommended for a scholarship, put into a club system (not much on offer), get extra coaching or what? Did they even think that far ahead? What an "independent" journalist needs to do is pay a surprise visit to these Academies and see what goes on there on a daily basis. I would doubt there's much action.
Theres a junior club thing going on at OG's, which is a step in the right direction, but I don't know much about it.

It's word of mouth and possibly a look at stats, especially if anyone is making hundreds consistently, which they aren't.
We haven't had a young batsman make hundreds with some regularity for many years. It's very surprising because the Bennets, Saul and Welch are good players, the bowling is mediocre at best, but they didn't get too many between them. Things may have been different if there had been any school cricket the last couple of years.

[secretzimbo]

I don't know if theres any kind of strategy but we can always hope. The appointments of Houghton, Chigumbura and Jarvis to their respective roles is either: 1) They have a development plan and trying to implement it. Or 2) Hamilton is siphoning off parts of his job so he can blame other people when things go tits up.

Hopefully Houghton's role is to try and write a coaching manual, and a national coaching philosophy/structure. Presumably his brief is to educate more coaches and get them qualified up as well. There's way too many 'coaches' in this country who are shit cricketers themselves and have never been anywhere near any kind of coach education.

Jarvis and Chigumbura as scouts, I'm not sure what the point is. Chigumbura is running an academy. Obviously any gems he 'unearths' are only going to be from one place. I suppose in theory the idea is that they would attend school games and club games? Maybe they'd host national trials or franchise trials or something? I'm not sure. I don't think 'scouts' on full time salaries are necessary in a country where we have a tiny cricket community and where everybody knows everybody anyway.

Really important we get school cricket (and sport in general) back up and running ASAP. People in this thread expecting these boys to go deep in the tournament into the last 8.......we haven't managed that since 2006. And all those previous teams have had school cricket at least. Most of these boys in our squad have barely played a competitive game of cricket anywhere between March 2020 and October 2021. That's a huge chunk of their development. If they achieve something impressive next month it really will be quite incredible. Although maybe some other countries have had the same issues.

We've got to get schools cricket up and running. And I think we need to try and get a franchise U19 system going as well. Not ad-hoc stuff but perhaps a proper competition, trophy, with fixtures. And not run over a single week either. Have it run over a couple of months. The problem I suppose is that kids don't want to be spending so much of their weekends playing. So that's difficult to work around and organise.


There's talk of the National Premier League returning as a winter league. That's good - and hopefully more kids would be able to be involved, especially if national team blokes are on tour and people are in the UK - should be opportunities for youngsters there. Also would give us year-round cricket which perhaps makes things a little more palatable or sustainable for the pros.

[Googly]

I agree that some kind of u19 or u21 cricket might be a useful way of seeing who would manage in the franchise system, a stepping stone so to speak, but it won't work. ZC cant organize a thing. Club cricket should be the means of identifying good players and we can't ever get in a full season of club cricket. I mean has there ever been a single season in the last 20 years without a hiccup.
I've always maintained that by u19 it's too late to develop a cricketer. You can see the good 'uns by 14 or 15. and that's the age where they make real progress.
You just can't get youngsters interested in club cricket on a Sunday. That urge to succeed and become a pro just doesn't seem to be there. You can ask a kid what he wants to do and he'll tell you he wants to be a pro, then ask him why he doesn't play club on a Sunday and he won't have an answer. It also boils down to lack of faith in a pro future here and the fact that our national side gets minced, so there's no-one they particularly want to emulate.
If we won some games against good sides, particularly at home, it would be a catalyst, but we don't play good sides and we don't win much.

[zimfan1]

I meant for the team that actually plays on any given day?
I don't think Chitare has any cricketing credentials whatsoever.
U19's should have level 4 coaches, if not level 3 at least, they're an international side.

If it's the guy I'm thinking of then he's been around schools for a long time in Harare/Mash. Think he might have been a teacher/coach at Prince Edward way back at the turn of the century and then moved on to Hellenic? But I mean to become convenor of selectors for a world cup from seemingly nowhere is a massive promotion. He must have done a fair amount of bottom-caressing to land that job recently.

Any coincidence that Rugg also went to Hellenic, his father is loaded. I smell a rat there.

[zimfan1]

Why are Dean Gibbs and Ross Mills not in the mix?

Gibbs is with the Dolphins in South Africa I think?

[Kriterion_BD]

Although maybe some other countries have had the same issues.

All the teams have the same issue. Indian team is full of debutants. The Bangladesh side is probably the most experienced, and they've only played 10 bilaterals in between world cups I think.

[Rajkumar Sharma]

Although maybe some other countries have had the same issues.

All the teams have the same issue. Indian team is full of debutants. The Bangladesh side is probably the most experienced, and they've only played 10 bilaterals in between world cups I think.

Bangladesh U19 team is strong in this World Cup. Differences between them and the title will be arrogant attitude of their youths.

[secretzimbo]

Although maybe some other countries have had the same issues.

All the teams have the same issue. Indian team is full of debutants. The Bangladesh side is probably the most experienced, and they've only played 10 bilaterals in between world cups I think.

Yeah yeah I get that everyone is in the same boat in terms of international cricket. But our boys haven’t even played school matches for two years . Have Bangladesh players not even played school/junior/local/club cricket even?

[Donald]

I saw an interview by our 'long distance coach' and he said any under 19s perform they would be given serious consideration for zim national team

[secretzimbo]

Any coincidence that Rugg also went to Hellenic, his father is loaded. I smell a rat there.

Your sense of smell is seeming rather accurate here….