Camp brings over 60 American football players to Paide
Estonia's sole regularly playing American football club, the Tartu Titans, hosted a training camp in Paide over the weekend which attracted over 60 players from across the region.
The Baltic American football league season starts soon, and the Titans are defending champions.
From Saturday morning to Sunday afternoon, representatives of five Baltic clubs, Estonia's only women's team plus two Estonian flag football clubs spent a total of nine hours on the field in a demanding training camp which culminated in a practice match (see gallery).
The teams were from Kaunas, Vilnius, and Klaipėda in Lithuania, along with a team from Riga plus the Titans – essentially the sum total of teams regularly playing at the moment.
For the duration of the camp, they managed to set aside their rivalries, Titans head coach Craig Hamer said, adding the atmosphere was very friendly and cooperative.
Hamer declared the camp a success and expressed hopes it will lead to the further development of the sport here, and of the Baltic league.
The Baltic American football league kicks off at the end of May.
Two Estonian-born players have to date made it to the sport's pinnacle, the NFL: Michael Roos, born in Taebla, Lääne County, who played offensive tackle for the Tennessee Titans for a decade, starting in 2005, and Margus Hunt from Karksi-Nuia, Viljandi County, who played defensive lineman first for SMU before being drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals in 2013. Hunt also later played for the Indianapolis Colts.
Add to that defensive lineman Chuck Ehin, born in California to Estonian parents and who played in the 1980s, mostly for the San Diego (now Los Angeles) Chargers.
--
Editor: Andrew Whyte, Siim Boikov
