BRIDGWATER College students recently welcomed the Visually Impaired Somerset County Cricket — known as VI SCC — team to play a match against the students.

The VI SCC Team contacted Carly Martin, the College’s Sports Maker at Bridgwater College to set up a game to train for their competitive season ahead.

VI cricket is played with a size three football containing ball bearings.

When the bowler is ready to release the ball, he checks first that the batter is ready, and then throws the ball so that it bounces twice before reaching the batsman which allows them to use the sound of the ball bearings to guide them towards the direction of the ball.

The students that were selected to play against the VI SCC team were a combination of Special Educational Needs (SEN) and Sport students.

The VI SCC team had a range of visual impairments, with some players having a complete loss of sight whilst others had varying degrees of blindness.

Therefore, the students were required to wear an arrangement of eyewear that helped to create a feeling of loss of sight.

This eye wear created a feeling of having tunnel vision, blurred vision, partial sight or complete blindness.

Helen Wheller, Sports lecturer at Bridgwater College said: “This was an excellent insight into disability sport. It was just wonderful that students who have full vision were able to experience and enjoy a sport with limited or no vision. My students thoroughly enjoyed the afternoon.

“We hope to set up further sessions with the team to continue and make the games more competitive.”

Liam Twigger, 17, from Bridgwater who studies the Level two Diploma in Sport said: “I enjoyed the day very much and was a great experience, they have enormous talent and for them to have little or no vision and play is a huge achievement!

“Me and the rest of the group thought it was a great afternoon and would love to do it again!”