A CRICKET club is offering specialised cricket sessions for people with disabilities.

Andover Cricket Club is going to begin offering Super 1s sessions for disabled young people.

These sessions will provide young people with a disability the opportunity to play cricket and are aimed at people aged between 13 and 25; no prior cricket knowledge or experience is required.

The sessions will take place from 6pm until 7pm on Wednesday evenings and will be run by specialist Hampshire coaches.

The cricket sessions are part of a scheme being run by the Hampshire Cricket Board with funding from the youth cricket and disability sport charity Lord’s Taverners.

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The scheme aims to provide young people with a chance to realise their potential, both on and off the pitch.

The sessions will provide attendees with the opportunity to take part in regular competitive sports, improving their mental and physical wellbeing, and giving them a sense of belonging, as well as confidence and independence.

The scheme will support participating clubs by providing them with the guidance, resources, and equipment they might need to welcome people with different needs and abilities.

Clubs that are taking part in the scheme are also able to apply for £500 in seed funding; this can be used to help deploy experienced coaches, purchase more adapted equipment or promote inclusive cricket sessions.

Andover Cricket Clubs’ membership secretary Matthew Knight, who is helping to organise the disability sessions at Andover, said: “They’re a chance to get people involved, and see if they like cricket.

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“Cricket is a really good sport for inclusiveness, because it’s a team sport, you have this team dynamic, but you also have your individual turn at things.

“You have a go at bat, you have a go at bowling, it’s individual but within a team context.

“In terms of people who want to try a team sport out, but they might find social interaction or communication a bit difficult, it’s actually pretty perfect for that.”

The sessions will run throughout the summer and are free to attend; the sessions are being run on a drop-in basis and attendees do not need to have attended prior sessions to join in.

To find out more information about these sessions, visit the Lord’s Taverners website https://www.lordstaverners.org/, or email Matthew Knight mattknight39@googlemail.com.

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