CRICKET IRELAND’S MULTI-MILLION euro sponsorship will be an investment in the country’s best young cricketers.

Indian multinational Shapoorji Pallonji Group yesterday announced a 10-year deal aimed at creating a pipeline of world class cricketers.

The funding will allow an expansion of the newly-renamed Shapoorji Pallonji Cricket Ireland Academy but performance director Richard Holdsworth stressed: “Quality is key.”

“How many players are going to come through and represent the senior Ireland men’s and women’s team every year? There’s only room for 11 in one side.

We need to make sure that the quality is kept very high, but what it will mean is that we can take on potentially more talent and invest in that talent.

The academy — which will be aimed at players aged 12 and up — will put an emphasis on mental as well as physical development.

“The detail of that is very much around bespoke programmes designed purely for the individual and looking at the needs of each player,” Holdsworth told this week’s episode of the Slog Sweep podcast.

“That could be technical needs and that might mean bringing in coaches from outside of Ireland who have experience from across all parts of the world. After all we’re playing a global game and we go to global tournaments regularly.

He added: “It’s not just about the cricket. We know that this game at any high level is about the mind.

We need to train our players and make sure that they have the right mindset, that they can cope with pressure, that they can cope with perhaps having a successful career in a sport.

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Click here to listen to the full interview with Richard Holdsworth on The Slog Sweep.

Also this week, former Ashes winner Chris Broad was in studio, Ryan Eagleson chatted about Carrickfergus’s clean sweep quadruple in the NCU and much, much more.

There’s a giant ‘Teddy Bears Picnic’ supporting Donegal by Michael Murphy’s home