The French are finally waking up to cricket

"If the French nobility had been capable of playing cricket with their peasants," the British historian G.M. Trevelyan once wrote, "their chateaux would never have been burnt."

Judging by a report in today's Mail on Sunday, the French have finally woken up to this:

Cricket is being introduced into the national curriculum for French primary schools, and enthusiasts hope the move will lead to cricket becoming a part of French culture. 

"We have far more open spaces here, so beautiful pitches will not be a problem and the French are certainly clever enough to understand the complicated rules," says Gilles Lefevre, an English teacher from Bordeaux, who learnt to love the game on holidays to the UK. 

"Culturally, cricket is all about the English but there is no reason at all why this game should not become a favourite here."