Sheppie juniors shine at Glenwood festival

After a long hiatus from sport in 2020 and 2021, the Robbie Coutts Cricket Academy, which operates from the Port Shepstone Country Club, was recently invited to take part in the annual Glenwood High School Primary Schools Festival.

This offered an exciting opportunity for the players to gain some game time, and build their experience on the field. The U13 team enjoyed a successful festival, winning four out of five games.

The team was placed in a group with Hillcrest Primary, Manor Gardens, Monument Primary and a Glenwood Invitation team.

“The Academy has adopted a philosophy of every player getting an opportunity to contribute to the team, every player would have a turn to bowl and the batting order was also changed in every game,” said coach Coutts.

With steady rain falling on the Friday morning the first match against Hillcrest on the famous Dixon Field at Glenwood was cancelled without a ball being bowled.

The team’s next match was against Manor Gardens. After winning the toss and batting first, the team set a defendable 96 in 20 overs.

Excellent fielding and catching ensured the team enjoyed an exciting 10 run win.

The organisers, with the mindset to play as much cricket as possible, rescheduled the remaining matches on Saturday, changing the format to a T10.

First up on Saturday morning was a strong Hillcrest Primary team, posting a big score batting first, Hillcrest comfortably defended the score to record a convincing win.

In the remaining three games the games were much closer, yet the team played good all round cricket to win their remaining games.

The team won by five wickets against Manor Gardens, by three wickets against the Glenwood Invitational team and by four wickets against Monument Primary.

The Festival proved to be an exciting, valuable and enjoyable time for the players, and they are looking forward to next year.

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