Gweru Cricket Club launches High Performance Centre

GWERU Cricket Club has launched a High Performance Centre at Cecil John Rhodes Primary School (CJR) in Gweru to be used for nurturing budding cricketers into professional players.

The centre was launched on Saturday at an event attended by Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) convenor of selectors and former national team skipper Tatenda Taibu.

A match pitting CJR and Lundi Park Primary School preceded the launch of the High Performance Centre. Lundi Park won the game by 51 runs.

The two schools have been adopted by Gweru Cricket Club as its breeding ground for talent. Taibu hailed the initiative. “It’s always good to have people who initiate something where we have schools and a club partnering to bridge the gap in the development of cricket.

“We have had challenges whereby youngsters play cricket at primary school, but when they go to high school there is no cricket and that’s where the club comes in,” said Taibu.

“The youngsters come in and still continue with the game at club level so that we do not lose talented cricketers along the way.

“This is one initiative that I can be part of where I can source equipment on their behalf from different countries,” he said.

Taibu said the cricket club is part of the grand plan to have more numbers playing the game to help widen the player selection base.

Gweru Cricket Club chairman John Makubalo said the centre would nurture raw talent into professional players.

“The reason we came up with this project is because we want to develop kids from the grassroots level. It is easy to teach basics and techniques at a tender age and therefore the centre will nurture raw talent into professional cricketers and this will benefit the whole country.

“We want this to be a feeder to the ZC set up,” said Makubalo. — @lavuzigara1