Gallery: Young dog handler to take part in Crufts competition
A YOUNG dog handler from Fenland will be among a Cambridgeshire team competing on the on world s greatest stage tomorrow (Saturday). Eight-year-old Aiden Murdoch, from Chatteris, will take part in the junior flyball competition at Crufts with his Labrador
A YOUNG dog handler from Fenland will be among a Cambridgeshire team competing on the on world's greatest stage tomorrow (Saturday).
Eight-year-old Aidan Murdoch, from Chatteris, will take part in the junior flyball competition at Crufts with his Labrador Lily and team-mates from Cambridgeshire Canines.
The club is based at Witchford but trains in the winter months at a farm warehouse on the outskirts of Chatteris.
Recent sessions on Tuesday evenings have seen youngsters fine tune their performance ready for Crufts.
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Club trainer Ellen Schofield said: "The children have been around the sport for a while because their parents are also club members. They watch their parents in competitions nearly every week and have picked up the sport really well.
"We are aiming to put in a good performance - and we want to return to Crufts next year."
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Aidan's team mates are box loader Shaun Marston, 16, his brothers Ryan, 13, and Jordan, 11, all from Ely; and Chantelle Flitton, aged 11, from Waterbeach.
Cambridgeshire Canines was formed two years ago by Mrs Schofield when she moved to Witchford from Derby.
She said: "There was nowhere around here to play flyball. I played it when I lived near Derby and loved it.
"We have now got six adult teams and the junior team. The club has proved incredibly popular.
"The junior team qualified for Crufts in May last year and have had a long time to wait. But it is finally here and we are really looking forward to it."
The flyball competition is a relay competition where dogs jump hurdles and collects a tennis ball from a box, before returning to their owner at the start line.
• Aidan and his colleagues take part in the Young Kennel Club competition at 9am tomorrow (Saturday).