Head of Disability Cricket Ian Martin believes the England and Wales Cricket Board has “moved mountains” to establish the profile of the game in the past couple of years.
Speaking at the inaugural Celebration of Disability Cricket event at Lord’s today, Martin said that opportunities to play the game were better than ever.
England has four national disability teams with pathways to each having been established, with the aid of Sport England, through three talent development centres.
“I think we’ve started the ball rolling with disability cricket and I think we have an awful long way to go before we get it to where I aspire it to be,” Martin said.
“But there’s no getting away from the fact that we’ve moved mountains in the last few years with support of the ECB and Sport England.”
A DVD highlighting the England Physical Disability team’s tour of the United Arab Emirates earlier this year took centre stage at the event.
“The purpose of the DVD is that we wanted some permanent record to show physically-disabled people in this country that it is a viable option for them,” Martin added.
“Sometimes the profile that the Paralympics sports get can make people think that disability sport is all about the handful of sports that compete at Paralympic level.
“Cricket is a bigger sport than it is given credit for within the disability world and I hope the production of the DVD will show just how professional we are in our preparation and how hard the players work.”
England’s Visually Impaired team will fly out to South Africa later this month to compete in the Blind World Cup.
Martin believes the programmes set up will ensure they are one of the best prepared teams.
“They have been prepared in a way that is going to give them the best chance to be the best that they can be,” he said.
“If that means that we come home with a World Cup, so be it.
“All we can ask for is that the players give everything and perform to the best of their ability and do their ability justice, which I don’t think we’ve always done.”
Martin has recently returned from a trip to Bangladeshwhere he shared ideas with the Asian nation’s cricket board about disabled coaching.
It was a sign of how highly the ECB’s programme is regarded and Martin hopes that it will help to grow the game in Bangladesh.
“We were invited over by the Bangladesh Cricket Board and the International Committee for the Red Cross to go and train and educate cricket coaches in Bangladesh in how to work with disabled players,” he said.
“They have a thriving disabled game out there, but the cricket board felt that they didn’t have the coaching experience to be able to work with those players.
“Hopefully what we were able to achieve was to shatter some myths and give those coaches the confidence to work with the players, the legacy of which I hope will be a Bangladesh national team and future international competition for England against Bangladesh going forward.”
For more interviews from today’s event at Lord’s click here to listen.