Cricket For Syrian Refugees 

Cricket is now moving out of the English-speaking box.

International Cricket Council (ICC) ousted Cuba and government control, Spanish-speaking teams. In the Shatila camp in Beirut, Syrian refugees compile an Arabic-speaking team.

Two million people decided to move away from the Syrian civil war to Lebanon, this is just an estimated overview the exact figure is not yet revealed. Shatila was emptied of 3000 Palestinian refugees in 1949, now Syrian refugees are also merged into this camp the total number of members in the camp is estimated to be more than 30000. 

The United Nations are providing proper food supply, shelter, blankets, and all types of medical support to the refugees. But sad news from the Lebanese government is that the refugees can only perform manual labor and nothing else. 

When Cricket was introduced in the camp in October 2019, only 40 Syrian refugee’s youngster’s hands up for this. 

Later the total figure went to nearly 140 at the end of the week. Zeitooneh and Basmeh, the regional authorities, we’re promoting cricket in the refugee camp. 

The prevailing yearning is to stage a  session every Friday afternoon in Shatila, of at least two hours, and build an under-13 and under-14 team, allowing both genders to participate, to participate in the mini-World Cup orchestrated on Hackney Marshes. 

To develop Syrian batting and fielding Bola Junior bowling machine is going to be provided by the organizers.

Ratna, the coach appointed for the refugee’s practice session was the former Bangladesh U-19 coach. As cricket is accepted after football in Cuba, one of the football grounds in Shatila is modified into a perfect batting pitch ground.

Good things take time, this gets confirmed by witnessing the current cricket craze from the Syrian refugees. 

After such a difficult phase when a lot was flawed under the bridge of the Near East from the time when it started. But the sport came back and ready to refurbish the bridges in an extraordinary way by the Syrian refugees.