PANJIM: Goa is all set to get a huge boost with Sports Authority of India in partnership with School Sports Promotion Foundation to tap budding talents at the school level.
The first National Talent – Search and Nuture Programme in its inaugural year will be open to football and cricket. More sports will be added from the next academic season.
Chetan Sharma, chairperson of the School Cricket Council is heading the talent search with the help of co-ordinators and district co-ordinators.
“We want to reach out to all the schools in Goa and encourage children to participate in inter-State matches. We are scouting for talent in four zones and those performing well will be participating in the inter-State tournaments,” informed Chetan, the former Indian cricketer.
“We have the support of the Sports Authority of India and with the help of the State co-ordinators and district co-ordinators we will scout for cricketing talent,” said Sharma.
The talent hunt is divided into National, State, District and Zone levels and children in the age group of 10 to 15 years are eligible to participate.
“This is the first season that we have begun the talent hunt with two disciplines, cricket and football. Hakim is incharge of football,” Sharma added.
The School Sports Promotion Foundation in partnership with Sports Authority of India, Goa and Andhra Pradesh will aggressively scout for cricketing talents for the year.
“We are looking to plug the promising cricketers into the BCCI fold. I am having talks with them and most of the senior players are very supportive about this. For cricket to develop we need to begin at the grassroot level. The schools are the best options to groom budding talent. We will get an all-rounder if we look in the right direction,” informed Sharma.
“I fail to understand why we do not have many all-rounders today in the Indian squad. We will never get to see a Kapil Dev because no one is interested in developing that talent,” said Sharma, commenting on the performance of the Indian cricket team.
Sharma appealed to all parents and schools to participate in the programme as it was in the interest of developing cricketing skills at quite at early age.
