NATCHEZ — Ever wonder what it’s like to be the one on the sideline calling the plays, giving words of encouragement or trying to get the best out of your players?

This summer four tennis players are learning exactly what it’s like to be a coach.

Alcorn State sophomore Pushpendra Pajpurohit, along with Franklin County’s Denise Harris and Cathedral’s all-state doubles tandem of Davis Beard and Cami Willard are assisting Cathedral tennis coach Henry Harris this summer with his youth tennis camp.

“So far it’s going really well,” Cathedral tennis coach Henry Harris said. “We’ve got a lot of kids that are new from last year (at the camp). With the extra help of the high school kids and Pushpendra (Pajpurohit), it’s helped relieve the pressure off of me.”

Over the course of the camp, which ends July 18, the campers learn the fundamentals of tennis.

“We have a number of kids who haven’t played before and you have to teach them the basics of the forehand and the backhand,” Henry Harris said. “Once that happens it’s pretty easy to keep them on track, but teaching them the forehand and the backhand, that’s the toughest thing.”

The elder Harris said not only does the camp benefit the younger kids, it also helps his coaches learn about themselves.

“This year I started to get some high school kids to give them something to do so they could understand their strokes by looking at other kids’ strokes because they all started as 8 and 9-year olds,” Harris said.

Beard agrees with Harris, and said the benefits of coaching are obvious.

“It helps us understand our game better by having to teach it and definitely how to deal with smaller kids.”

Pajpurohit, who hails from India, said the most difficult part sometimes is getting the kids to mind.

“It’s tough. Sometimes the children don’t understand what I tell them. If I tell them to pick up the ball, they’ll be like ‘no, I’m not picking up the ball.’”

Willard echoed Pajpurohit’s sentiments.

“They don’t seem to want to mind all the time, but once they start playing the game they realize how fun it is and they start liking it.”

To Beard, the most rewarding part of coaching children is seeing their progress.

“They improve so much faster than we do because they’re just starting, so you can see it a lot.”