Top recognition for cricket ‘junkie’

FELIXTON COLLEGE cricket ‘junkie’ Teresa Wickham, who dedicates most of her spare time to coaching cricket, was the recipient of a special award during the dinner break of the Dolphins vs Cobras one day match played at Kingsmead.

This was in recognition of her sterling work in the sport at grassroots level.

‘Having never taught cricket before, my introduction to the rudiments of the task was challenging,’ she reflects.

‘I was familiar with the terminology as my dad had played a lot of club cricket and I grew up in a home where my family were avid viewers of cricket on television,’ says Wickham.

The coaching of mini cricket was where she started.

Festivals and tournaments not available in those early days made things difficult.

But an invitation to a mini cricket seminar at Black Mountains changed all this.

‘It was a wonderful experience as I got to network with other coaches and learnt a lot from some wonderful motivational speakers.

‘It was pretty obvious from my experience here that we were a long way behind.

‘This was perhaps a major reason why we were struggling to get suitable representation in older age groups in our schools here in Zululand.

‘I spoke to those in charge and got them to put a concerted effort into mini cricket and the development of the game in our area.

‘The response was marvellous, resulting in the staging of a number of well organised cricket festivals throughout Zululand.

‘The number one passion of mine is to introduce mini cricket to as many children as possible.

‘I have had great pleasure in helping Anton Geringer, who is in charge of cricket at the school.’

She is also involved with the U13 uThungulu girls cricket squad and on top of this has recently completed a Linear scoring course.

Teresa is certainly making a concerted effort to improve the standard of cricket amongst the Zululand youth and thoroughly deserves the accolades.