Photo: Gerry Huberty

Luxembourg's cricket development officer Ben Embleton explains his strategy for boosting the game in Luxembourg

Photo: Gerry Huberty

Cricket coach to the juniors Graham Cope

Photo: Gerry Huberty

It was a first for both the game of cricket and for Luxembourg. Uniting key figures from the Luxembourg cricket scene, schools and sporting organisations, the conference at the Olympic Sports Federation offices sought ways to help establish cricket as a regular fixture in schools.

Cricket development officer Ben Embleton explained: “Our aims were to bring together as many different people as possible to discuss introducing cricket into schools in Luxembourg.”

A British national, Ben took on the mantle of making cricket better-known in Luxembourg some four months ago. Since then, he has run a number of introductory training sessions in both private and state schools.

“Actually, it's been very positive. At the end of every session I've done at least some of the kids came to me asking if I could come back again next week,” said Ben, adding: “I did a session at the European primary school with a German class. They had never seen cricket before and were aged around eight to nine years old. They were absolutely desperate for me to come back the next week. I had to remind them they were on holidays next week and wouldn't be in school!”

Ben's next step will be to train teaching staff in schools or as he says “to get the ball rolling” so that they can continue the work he has begun.

Among the speakers at the conference was national rugby development officer Marty Davis, who has made great strides in raising the profile of rugby in Luxembourg during the last eight years.

Ben said: “We're probably a level below rugby because we don't even get the exposure. But, I think that input was good. It makes you realise that it didn't happen overnight for rugby. When you first start you're very anxious to get going and you expect things to happen quite quickly. It shows what's achievable and we're not completely mad for trying to bring in a new sport. On the other hand we shouldn't expect 20,000 people playing the game in one year.”