The Guyana Cricket Board elections scheduled for today have been postponed keeping the hopes of Guyana Cricket Board Secretary Anand Sanasie's hopes alive of challenging incumbent Ricky Skerritt for the presidency of Cricket West Indies.
Should the current board be swept from power, it would delegitimize Sanasie's run for the presidency.
According to reports emerging from Guyana, the elections, the first in more than a decade, was put off after reported mounting pressure to have it delayed, according to cricket commentator and talk show host Andrew Mason, who reported early this morning that there was an attempt at the highest level to stop the elections.
He reported that a lot of pressure was being put on the counties that would have been voting and that the Minister of Sport in Guyana Charles Ramson Jr was to meet with the president of Guyana on the matter.
A later report just after midday Jamaica time, said that the elections would not be held.
“The Ombudsman turned up just before 1 ‘0’ clock and said as the result of an email he received last night (Thursday) the elections could not be held today."
This was due mainly to the no show of the Essequibo Cricket Board, one of three counties that would have been voting in the elections.
“The Essequibo board said it was simply not ready,” according to Mason, who added that the boards of Berbice and Demerara are upset about the development.
Earlier this week, lawyers for Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) Secretary Anand Sanasie wrote to Guyana’s Culture, Youth and Sports Minister Charles Ramson Jr and Attorney Kamal Ramkarran, objecting to the appointment of both a cricket Ombudsman as well as the seven-day time period given for the staging of elections, claiming they were illegal under the Guyana Cricket Administration Act.
In response, Ramson Jr said he was on firm legal ground and well within the powers of the Guyana Cricket Administration Act.
Texas A&M’s Charokee Young will miss out on the SEC Championships that began on Thursday because she has been exposed to someone infected by Covid-19.
It will be a battle of the Southern Caribbean for the Sir Clive Lloyd trophy, when Guyana Jaguars face-off with the unbeaten Trinidad & Tobago Red Force in the CG Insurance Super50 Final on Saturday, after the Guyanese comfortably defeated the Windward Islands Volcanoes in the second semi-final.
Playing on Thursday at the Coolidge Cricket Ground, Guyana’s victory was first set up by a magnificent century from Shimron Hetmyer, who was deservedly named the CG Insurance Man-of-the-Match. He scored his seventh List A century of 112 and it came off 80 balls with 11 fours and five sixes. He was well supported by Raymon Reifer who made a career-best 90 off 104 balls with eight fours and three sixes.
The left-handed pair boosted the Jaguars to 305 for 7 – the third 300-plus total in the tournament. Then, under the floodlights, leading wicket-taker Gudakesh Motie (53 for 4) led the charge with the ball as the Windwards were routed for 210 all out in 46.4 overs.
The Jaguars started poorly with the bat and were forced into errors courtesy of some outstanding bowling by the Volcanoes. They initially slumped to 63 for 4 in the 12th over as skipper Leon Johnson was out first ball after he top-edged an attempted hook off pacer Ray Jordan – who had an inspired first spell of 12 for 3. It was Kevin Stoute who took a stupendous catch. to dismiss Johnson, as he ran in from the fence at long-leg and dived full stretch.
One run later, Hetmyer (12) was dropped by wicket-keeper Emmanuel Stewart. This proved to be the game-changing moment as in partnership with Reifer, who was playing his first game of competition, Hetmyer procured a regional List A record fifth-wicket partnership of 194. The total eclipsed the previous mark of 159 unbroken between Devon Thomas and Jahmar Hamilton for the Leeward Islands against Combined Campuses & Colleges at Conaree, St Kitts in Super50 2019.
Although the Windwards kept the Jaguars from scoring an even bigger score by conceding only 49 scored in the final 10 overs, they never looked capable of chasing the target. No one supported top-scoring opener Alick Athanaze, who made a patient 58.
Former Cricket West Indies (CWI) president, Dave Cameron, insists the controversial eligibility rules put in place during his tenure were never meant to disenfranchise players.
The legislation, which was implemented as the region jostled with the cash-rich T20 leagues for the commitment of its top players, stated that players who did make themselves available for domestic competitions would be ineligible for international selection.
As a result, many of the region’s top players were often left out of the line-up, which left the Windies' Test and ODI sides shorn of some of their best talents. Cameron insists that the hope at the time was to encourage more balance between the West Indians taking part in cash-rich T20 leagues and representing the regional team.
“It was never about not wanting players to play around the world. We respected that, we accepted that, but, West Indies cricket doesn’t have a product if we don’t have our best players playing. So we needed to find a way to get our players to have the understanding that you can’t play everything,” Cameron told the Mason and Guest radio program.
“In the early days, I had a conversation with the players about telling us what they were going to play and when they would be available. So the selectors could understand where they want to go. After the strike occurred in India players decided that they weren’t going to play, and for the reduced salaries, so the West Indies first policy never actually got a chance,” he added.
“It was never intended to disenfranchise anybody, but look at what is happening in New Zealand, they still play in the leagues but they give their all to New Zealand when New Zealand is on the stage. That’s all we were saying, as our senior players, you can’t play everything.”
Cricket West Indies (CWI) today confirmed its third new multi-year broadcast rights agreement with SuperSport securing the rights to West Indies cricket until the end of 2024 in sub-Saharan Africa.
The four-year agreement will see SuperSport feature exclusive live coverage of all West Indies international home matches and regional tournaments played in the Caribbean on its television and digital platforms.
As part of the agreement, West Indies cricket will now be seen in over 54 African countries and islands, including South Africa, Zimbabwe, Nigeria and Kenya. SuperSport’s coverage starts with the recently confirmed West Indies versus Sri Lanka series which commences on Wednesday, March 3 with three CG Insurance T20 International matches.
The agreement also includes the rescheduled visit by South Africa to the Caribbean in June 2021, a tour that had to be rescheduled from July 2020 due to COVID-19.
“This new long-term SuperSport agreement ensures that the much-loved West Indies teams will be accessible to an expanded number of African consumer markets with sub-Saharan Africa’s premier broadcaster,” said CWI President Ricky Skerritt.
“As CWI’s third major media rights agreement finalized in the past few weeks, we are excited that SuperSport will be featuring every international series and regional tournament from the Caribbean, including the upcoming Sri Lanka Series and the rescheduled tour of the West Indies by South Africa in June.”
Johnny Grave, CWI CEO said the agreement is another step of taking West Indies crickets into new markets.
“We are absolutely delighted to confirm this significant four-year agreement with SuperSport to ensure that millions of cricket fans in Sub-Saharan Africa can follow West Indies Cricket in the Caribbean,” Grave said.
“By partnering with Africa’s leading sports broadcaster, CWI continues to deliver against our strategic objective of increasing the worldwide audience for and access to one of the world’s most loved cricket teams and regions.”
This is the third major broadcast agreement announced by CWI following the recent ground-breaking agreements with ESPN+ for the United States market and with BT Sport for the United Kingdom and Ireland markets.
Of all the important partnerships that Joshua Da Silva featured in during the West Indies successful Test series against Bangladesh, there was one that the Trinidadian wicketkeeper-batsman said he enjoyed the most.
Thierry Henry has stepped down as Montreal head coach after one season in charge.
Former Arsenal and Barcelona forward Henry was appointed by the MLS side in November 2019 following his sacking by Ligue 1 outfit Monaco earlier in the year after just 20 games in charge.
He guided the club to the 2020 MLS Cup Playoffs in his solitary campaign, where they were eliminated in the first round by the New England Revolution.
Montreal had to relocate to the United States last year amid the coronavirus pandemic and would have to do so again when the new season starts in April.
Henry, who had been linked with the managerial position at Championship club Bournemouth before Jonathan Woodgate was appointed, cited the continued separation from his family as the motivating factor behind his decision.
"It is with a heavy heart that I've decided to take this decision," Henry said in a club statement. "The last year has been an extremely difficult one for me personally. Due to the worldwide pandemic, I was unable to see my children.
"Unfortunately, due to the ongoing restrictions and the fact that we will have to relocate to the US again for several months will be no different.
"The separation is too much of a strain for me and my kids. Therefore, it is with much sadness that I must take the decision to return to London and leave Montreal."
Sporting director Olivier Renard added: "Thierry's departure is unfortunate and premature because this was very promising, but he informed me of his desire to be back with his family because the situation was and remains very difficult for both him and his family.
"I want to thank him, first on a human level because he led the players by example last year by being away from his family, but also from a sporting level and for what we have built together since his arrival.
"We wanted to elevate this club and we are on the right track. The process of finding a new head coach is already underway and I will be looking for someone who is aligned with the philosophy we have implemented."
Top fashion designer Louis Vuitton has come under fire for a recently released 'Jamaica-inspired' line of clothing, which seems to have mixed up the colours of the country’s national flag.
The description for the pricey high-end fashion products, which include a $US1,366 sweater and jumper, initially described one item as a ‘Jamaican striped sweatshirt.’ Additionally, the other description read 'Jumper with a striped design inspired by the national flag of the Caribbean island.’
The only was problem was that instead of the island’s flag colours of black, green and gold, the design featured green, yellow, and red which are typically associated with the African country Ethiopia. The aforementioned colours do, however, feature prominently in an aspect of the country’s culture as those are the colours of the flag of the Rastafari movement. The religious movement, founded in Jamaica in the 1930s, adopted a version of the Ethiopian flag used by Emperor Haile Selassie during his reign.
The mistake was quickly seized upon and ridiculed by some with Cedella Marley, herself a fashion designer and daughter of late great Reggae king Bob Marley, pointing out the fashion designer’s mistake via an Instagram post.
"Bob says that's the Ethiopian flag @LouisVuitton,” she posted, along with a photograph of the late singer.
Some also criticised the company for cultural appropriation and exploiting the island's brand. Following the wave of criticism, the item was removed from the company’s website, with an apology and explanation later appearing in the UK Guardian newspaper.
“We are deeply sorry for the error made in the description of our website and we have corrected it. The sweater belongs to the spring-summer 2021 season of the men's collection, which is armed with the colors green, yellow and red, the colors of the Ethiopian flag, in honor of African independence, including the tribute to the culture of Ghana, where our designer Virgil Abloh comes from.”
Jamaica’s World Cup campaign is set to be bolstered by the addition of West Ham striker Michail Antonio, who reports say, is to accept an invitation from the Jamaica Football Federation to represent the Reggae Boyz.
Trinidad and Tobago Red Force made it six wins in a row, as they produced a commanding performance to power past the Jamaica Scorpions and into the CG Insurance Super50 final.
This victory was set up by three key efforts, Ravi Rampaul started with the ball and was then complemented by Lendl Simmons and Nicholas Pooran with the bat.
Firstly Rampaul, in claiming his second CG Insurance Man-of-the-Match award of the tournament, with figures of 29 for 4, played a key role in restricting the Scorpions to a below-par score of 255-7 on a very good batting surface.
In reply, batting second for the sixth consecutive match, Simmons (63) scored his 27th List A half-century to set the perfect platform, before Pooran’s unbeaten innings of 54, his 11th List A half-century, finished things off in style with eight overs to spare.
Earlier on, Jamaica lost the early wicket of Aldaine Thomas but after that John Campbell (88) and Brandon King (58) played well. When they reached 95-1 in the 22nd over, King smashed Jason Mohammed for a big straight six to bring up his second half-century of the tournament.
The Red Force would strike five overs later with the Scorpions, at 113-2 in the 27th over, when King gave Anderson Phillip his second wicket, playing back to a delivery that kept a bit low. The wicket ended the 108-run second-wicket alliance between Campbell and King.
At 168-2 in the 35th over, the Scorpions looked set for a big final charge. However, the Campbell/McCarthy third-wicket partnership of 58 runs would end as McCarthy (35) presented a catch off veteran leg-spinner Imran Khan to Rampaul at leg on.
Attempting to defend that total, the Scorpions almost got a perfect start in the first over, but Nkrumah Bonner dropped a difficult long-on boundary catch from Simmons off Scorpions off-spinner Jamie Merchant. When Red Force were 29-0 in the fifth over, Evin Lewis (14) was also dropped by Campbell at first slip, again by the unlucky Merchant. As the big-hitting opening duo raced to their 50-partnership in the eighth over, those missed catches were even more critical.
Leading up to the 25th over, Jamaica got three wickets, the last of which when Simmons (68) skied a catch off Allen to Bonner at the long-on boundary. Despite T&T further losing Jason Mohammed (41), who was bowled by Odean Smith, Pooran (54 not out) was joined by captain Pollard (36 not out) who quickly hit five massive sixes to celebrate the win in style and get ready for Saturday's grand final.
Prominent Guyana attorney Arudranauth Gossai has cast doubts any injunction put forward to prevent the staging of the Guyana Cricket Board elections on Friday will succeed, as he does not believe the objections to be ground on a firm legal footing.
Earlier this week, lawyers for Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) Secretary Anand Sanasie wrote sharply worded letters to Guyana Culture, Youth and Sports Minister Charles Ramson Jr and Attorney Kamal Ramkarran, objecting to the appointment of both a cricket Ombudsman and the 7-day time period given for the staging of elections as illegal under the Guyana Cricket Administration Act.
The attorneys had given the minister until Tuesday to withdraw the appointment or that legal action could be taken to quash the appointment. The letters further asserted that close relations with Cricket West Indies president Ricky Skerritt had tainted the overall decision.
In response, Ramson Jr flatly rejected all the assertions made by Sanasie’s attorneys and insisted that he was on firm legal ground and well within the powers of the Guyana Cricket Administration Act.
“While it must be stated at the outset that since the restoration of the provisions of the Guyana Cricket Administration Act 2014 and pursuant to Order of Court by Justice Fidela Corbin in Berbice Cricket Board v Fizul Bacchus et al dated 3rd April 2019 in Action number 2018-HC-DEM-CIV-FDA-1200, the capacity in which your client purports to instruct you is not recognized, paragraph two is denied and your position on the issue is incorrect as it is res judicata (see Judgement of Fidela Corbin dated 3rd April 2019 in SAYWACK V LEWIS in Action number 2018-HC-DEM-CIV-FDA-808),” the minister wrote in response.
“The Guyana Cricket Administration Act 2014, the subject Minister is entitled, empowered, and obliged to appoint the Cricket Ombudsman and the date for the first election of the Guyana Cricket Board until completed. I fraternally take the liberty to direct your attention to paras 15, 26, and 27 of the judgment.”
Gossai, who has been closely aligned to the issue as a legal representative of the Berbice Cricket Board (BC), agrees the minister is within his rights.
“In order to get an injunction you have to show that your claim is going to succeed. I see some letters circulating in the press purportedly from Mr Sanasie’s lawyers to the minister to the president of Cricket West Indies and the Ombudsman and based on those things in the letter if those are the grounds then they are bound to fail,” Gossai told the Mason and Guest radio program.
“One of the things they are saying is that the minister cannot appoint another Ombudsman because he has already appointed an Ombudsman and that person has resigned. But strangely enough, I notice in that letter that there is no mention of Sanasie when he was quote and quote secretary of the cricket board Mr (Dave) Cameron had consulted with the minister and appointed another Ombudsman. For some strange reason, it might have been an oversight but that was left out of the correspondence.”
Sunil Ambris, captain of the Windward Islands Volcanoes is not overly concerned about the team’s current form going into tomorrow’s semi-finals of the CG Insurance Super 50 against the Guyana Jaguars. However, he said he is expecting his team to be better with the bat if they are to avenge their defeat earlier this week to the Jaguars.
When the teams met on Monday, the final match of the preliminary round, the Jaguars walloped the Volcanoes, who plunged to a nine-wicket defeat. However, Ambris said his team is ready to dust itself off and go to battle once again.
“We started off (the season) really well. I think we played two really poor matches but the camaraderie in the team is still pretty good, the guys are still high-spirited and looking forward to the semi-finals,” he said, adding that he wants the team to get off to a better start with the bat, something that we have been struggling with throughout the season.
“That’s something that we definitely need to address,” he said.
The Volcanoes will be strengthened by the inclusion of Kavem Hodge and Ambris is delighted to have him in the team for the must-win encounter.
“He brings a lot. He is one of the better players in the team. He is an all-rounder. He is more than likely give us 10 overs and he is one of the better batters in the team and he has a lot of experience being a part of the Windward Islands team for the longest while and he knows what it feels like to win a championship, so he will definitely bring a lot to the team,” he said.
Tyra Gittens goes into tomorrow’s SEC Championships in a confident mood seeing how well she has performed indoors this season.
Former West Indies batting coach, Toby Radford, has suggested calls to replace all-rounder Jason Holder are an overreaction and would stick with the current captain, despite the success of Kraigg Brathwaite in Bangladesh.
Brathwaite was widely commended for his role in leading an understrength team to a 2-0 win away to Bangladesh earlier this month. Holder, on the other hand, was one of 12 players to pull out of the tour after citing health and safety concerns.
Holder had, however, also pointed to feeling some level of fatigue having had to deal with quarantine situations in both the West Indies prior tours of England and New Zealand. However, in addition, aspects of the team’s performance on those tours had also put Holder and his captaincy under the microscope.
While admitting that the team had performed exceptionally well in Bangladesh, Radford, however, sees no reason to replace Holder as the man in charge for the upcoming Sri Lanka series.
“I think they surprised everybody not least of all Bangladesh, probably their own supporters as well. They performed really well. But it’s very easy to get carried away, isn’t it? You have a couple of big wins like that and then suddenly we have done it because Kraigg Brathwaite is captain and Jason Holder wasn’t captain,” Radford told the Mason and Guest radio program.
“Who’s to know if Jason was captain whether you would have had the two wins anyway,” he added.
“There were a lot of very good individual performances and because individuals play well and you win two matches, to me, that isn’t down to captaincy.”
In supporting his decision to stick with Holder, Radford pointed to the example of the incident with India captain Virat Kolhi, which occurred during the Asian team's big win over Australia.
“It was raised the other day, someone mentioned Virat Kohli. They (India) lost the game in Australia, he went home for the birth of his child. They went suddenly and won a couple of games. When they started the Test series against England, in India, nobody questioned whether Kohli should captain the team. He came back in because he was captain.”
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