Parchment to officially take up head coach role at Atlanta Academy

Former West Indies and Jamaica batsman Brenton Parchment left Jamaica recently to officially take up his role as the head coach for the Ricardo Powell Cricket Academy (RPCA) based in Roswell Georgia, United States.

Parchment, who was recruited by another former West Indies and Jamaica player Ricardo Powell, will be responsible for the planning of programmes and developing talent at the US-based high-performance cricket coaching entity.

Along with that role, Parchment will also lead the RPCA Magics cricket franchise in competitions across the United States.

For Parchment, the synergy with the new role was the perfect fit with his philosophy of developing players’ natural talent that will bring them to the elite level.

“It was a natural fit for me to join the RPCA as they toured Jamaica a few years ago and I was invited to get involved with them with regard to coaching. Ricardo (Powell) then asked me to join them in the US and I decided to grab the opportunity with both hands,” said Parchment.

Parchment, who played two Tests, seven One-Day Internationals and one T20 International for the West Indies, possesses a wealth of experience having coached in England, Ireland, the Netherlands, Australia as well as the Caribbean.

The former St Elizabeth representative currently holds a Cricket Australia high-performance level three coaching certificate as well as an England Cricket Board coaching certificate.

The former Jamaica Tallawahs assistant coach says he wants to unearth the next big cricketers to come out of North America.

“The main aim is to develop the next set of US cricketers and we want to be producing a lot of international cricketers. The whole objective is to make it the dominant academy in the US and not just cricketers in the US, but anyone who wants to take their game to the next level.”

The RPCA currently has US cricketers Stephen Taylor, Kyle Phillips and Sagar Patel in their academy with a number of young talents also signed at the Georgia-based institution.

The Academy currently has a junior elite programme straight up to the professional ranks, and Parchment is keen to ensure that every cricketer excels at every element of the game.

“I want to first create a pathway so that kids can know where they are at and how they can get to where they want to be.”