Optimists Cricket Club

This coming weekend, many young players who have developed their skills at the Optimists cricket club, will be participating in  Luxembourg’s national U18s Cricket squad as they play in an international competitive tournament under the full ICC ODI rules and will play three tough games in three days against Belgium, France and Germany.

This tournament is being used as preparation for the ICC U19s European Championship next year by the cricketing neighbours to Luxembourg who benefit from much greater resources and player numbers than Luxembourg. Nevertheless, the Luxembourg team are happy to enter the tournament as underdogs and perhaps create a surprise. The tournament will be played under full international one day cricket rules involving 50 overs per side, powerplay restrictions and even possibly the unfathomable Duckworth/Lewis method of scoring rain-affected matches.

Luxembourg’s squad of 13 players have been training hard in preparation for the tournament under the stewardship of National Coach Ben Embleton. This involved individual fitness plans, intensive weekly training sessions and a 4 day training camp in July. Captained by Timothy Barker, the team will face Belgium in their first game on Friday with the match being played at the cricket ground of Karlsruhe Lions. France will be the opponents on Saturday followed by the final match on Sunday against the host nation Germany.