helicopterking wrote:
Have you watched a U/12 match?
U/12s 6-7 of them would struggle to do it consistently . So you want them to just stand in the field for an hour and 4 kids bowl all day, that should keep them interested in the game. It's about getting them to participate. The best players should be encouraged to attempt to play a higher age bracket.
Mate, I've coached them for the last 3 years along with representative sides for under 11's. 80% of the kids I've seen have no hassles getting the ball up the other end with either on or two bounces max, wides do become an issue with the lesser skilled 3 or 4 in the team.
Under 10's however, most of the coaches are pretty good at seeing this as a formative age group and are happy letting some of the kids bowl from the first strap after the crease line.
That is why I asked you what association have you been watching, the PDCA seems to work pretty well for the under 12 age group and I watched my first Western Suburbs match yesterday for the under 11's and it seemed ok.
I do stress to the kids in my team that they'll get two overs and I'll judge by them overs if they get anymore, I do point out every run that they concede through wides are extra runs that we have to make, I spend a lot of time on the lesser skilled players and their bowling by putting bowling discs on the ground and making sure they aim for them along with working on keeping their arm up nice and high and just focusing on where they want the ball to land.
I've coached junior cricket for the past 15 years and my aim each season is to make the gap between the best and weakest player in the team as small as possible.