THE Institute of Sports (INSPORTS) received high praise from Minister of Sport Olivia Grange after 13 of the 14 Jamaica Under-15 cricket team members came through its cricket talent search.

Grange made an impromptu visit to the agency on Wednesday and inspected the new sports equipment purchased by the Sports Development Foundation (SDF) which will be distributed to basic and primary schools.

“I must say that INSPORTS is living up to its mandate of unearthing talent at the grass roots level. We have to build back cricket here in Jamaica, and I am very proud that the Under-15 team — that has done very well — 13 of the 14 members came from our cricket nursery,” said Grange.

INSPORTS is an agency of the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport tasked with unearthing talent at the grass root level.

“We went across the island, uncovered talent, had them in camps for a few weeks, and they came out well prepared for the Jamaica cricket team — and I am happy to say that they have done well,” she added.

Clan Carthy Primary’s Coach Dwayne Walker, along with students Tina McKenzie, Tyrek Jackson and Rohando Smith, got a first-hand view of the new equipment and demonstrated the various techniques to the minister, who was more than pleased.

On display were cricket bats, balls, plastic stumps; badminton racquets and nets; a table tennis board; size-4 footballs and small goals; kiddies hurdles and goal nets; and skipping ropes for basic schools.

“I want to encourage you youngsters to make use of the opportunities we are providing you. I want to encourage the sports officers to work even harder than you have been working, and step it up now that you have equipment to go out there into the basic and primary schools to get that much more out of our youngsters,” Grange implored.

Meanwhile, INPORTS Acting Chairman Ian Forbes said the recent acquisition of sporting equipment will go a long way to unearth talent at the grass roots level.

“Many times the system is starved of proper equipment and it is important that we teach the young ones, in particular, from the grass roots level the proper techniques, et cetera.

“There are some things like skipping [that] pretty much would mimic, somewhat, hurdling. Hula-hoop [is useful] in terms of [helping the youngsters in] being flexible and [in terms of] stretching. Hopscotch [is good] for the bounding events like the long jump, high jump, triple jump etc.

“But it is also good to have proper equipment [which is] age-appropriate, size-appropriate and, above all, safe equipment for the wide array of disciplines here,” said Forbes.