KFC has de­cid­ed to take care of the na­tion's young crick­eters dur­ing this COVID-19 pan­dem­ic by bring­ing on board the KFC Spicy On­line Crick­et Coach­ing pro­gramme.

The fast-food restau­rant is part­ner­ing with Rodeo Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, own­ers of Crick­et360, and the Ku­mar Ram­pat Crick­et Acad­e­my (KR­CA) to bring this to fruition.

Speak­ing at the launch, KFC's vice-pres­i­dent Roger Ramb­harose said: "I know that this is the fes­tive sea­son but we are here for crick­et and youth de­vel­op­ment which is a ma­jor thrust for the KFC brand. This pro­gramme was born from the COVID-19 lock­down.

"Where we saw a crit­i­cal need for kids to re­main ac­tive at home and most im­por­tant­ly for the kids who liked crick­et to have ac­cess to qual­i­ty coach­ing tips from qual­i­fied and ex­pe­ri­enced coach­es and play­ers. Thus, in part­ner­ship with Vin­ode Mam­chan of Rodeo Com­mu­ni­ca­tions and Crick­et360, our vir­tu­al coach­ing pro­gramme was born.

"This pro­gramme was even recog­nised by our glob­al KFC CEO Mr Tony Low­ings, who is an­oth­er avid crick­et fan. In the 2021 pro­gramme, we have de­cid­ed to take it up a lev­el, we have en­gaged one of the most ex­pe­ri­enced coach­es in the re­gion, “Pro­fes­sor” Ku­mar Ram­pat and Kr­is­han Ram­pat and their Crick­et Acad­e­my in this project. As they are re­spect­ed as run­ning one of the best Crick­et Acad­e­mies in the Caribbean. They have pro­duced many tal­ent­ed crick­eters at all lev­els of T&T and West In­dies crick­et right here at the KR­CA."

"We are look­ing in the first sea­son to have 14 episodes, each half an hour long and we will be us­ing Crick­et360 me­dia plat­forms to dis­trib­ute the con­tent to young crick­eters.

"I will al­so take this op­por­tu­ni­ty to ex­tend this pro­gramme for free to be used by the rel­e­vant gov­ern­ment min­istries if they so choose. This pro­gramme has been en­dorsed by the T&T Crick­et Board (TTCB) and Sec­ondary Schools Crick­et Coun­cil. I will like to thank Mr Az­im Bas­sarath and Mr Dud­nath Ram­keesoon and the pres­i­dent of the Sec­ondary School Crick­et League Mr Su­ru­j­dath Ma­habir for their sup­port on this ini­tia­tive."

Al­so present at the launch, which took place at KFC En­deav­our, was Ram­keesoon, the act­ing chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer (CEO) of the TTCB. He said the board is ful­ly in sup­port of this ven­ture and will be lend­ing sup­port in any way they can.

"We are very hap­py that KFC has tak­en this ini­tia­tive with Crick­et360 and KR­CA. We live in an age where we want the kids to be in­volved in mean­ing­ful ac­tiv­i­ties and this is one way we can get them to do some­thing pos­i­tive. I like the on­line idea be­cause the COVID in here and not go­ing any­where soon. We need to reach out to these kids and this is a great way to do just that."

Ma­habir said it's an idea that will def­i­nite­ly help sec­ondary school crick­eters.

"Our young crick­eters will be able to lap-up this from a well re­spect­ed and qual­i­fied coach in Ku­mar Ram­pat."

The school teacher added: "Just as we have on­line class­es for aca­d­e­mics here comes on­line crick­et coach­ing as well and this I must add is a bril­liant idea by Roger Ramb­harose a great friend of crick­et and KFC."

Ram­pat in his ad­dress urged kids to keep look­ing at the ses­sions re­peat­ed­ly.

"Those ses­sions will be on the Crick­et360 plat­forms where you can ac­cess it over and over again and I want to urge young crick­eters and crick­eters, on the whole, to use it as much as you can to work on your game. This comes to you at no cost be­cause of the gen­er­ous heart of KFC."

The ses­sions will start rolling out from the sec­ond week of Jan­u­ary and all crick­eters will be giv­en ad­vance no­tice when they can start ben­e­fit­ting.