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WICB to earn US 4.5 Million from CPL

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Tuesday, 14 May 2013 12:06

The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) will earn US$4.5M each year from their deal with Verus International the owners of the Caribbean Premier League (CPL), a WICB Director has announced.  

The WICB earnings will also include an annual license fee of US 1.5 m which takes inflation rates into account, Director Baldath Mahabir has stated.

“The West Indies Cricket Board was running the regional T20 tournament and was losing US$3M a year because there were no sponsors,” said Mahabir.

“Now with this deal with the CPL we have our players playing good quality T20 cricket and the WICB don’t have to fork out the US$3M to stage it”.

The CPL which has replaced the regional T20 tournament will bowl off on July 30 and will have six teams coming from T&T, Barbados, Jamaica, Antigua, Guyana and St Lucia.

Mahabir said it would have been difficult for the WICB to go the route of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) by owning the tournament and having franchises.

“The WICB needed someone to bankroll this tournament because when you look at the economy in the region, it would have been different for the WICB to sell the franchises,”he said.

“You might have gotten buy in from say Trinidad and Tobago but some of the other countries would have found it difficult to be part of it”.

CPL fixtures revealed over the weekend see each franchise playing seven matches, three at home, three away and one at a neutral venue.

The semi-finals and finals are carded for Trinidad and Tobago.

Jamaican batsmen under fire after losing four-day title

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Tuesday, 14 May 2013 11:21

Jamaica’s batsmen are being blamed for the team’s unsuccessful bid to win the Regional Four day title for the sixth year running.  

The team’s top order batsmen in particular have come under fire even from their own colleagues who say poor batting caused Jamaica to surrender the title they have been winning for the past five years.

 "I believe this is the worst season in terms of our batting display as a unit,” declared Left-arm orthodox slow bowler Nikita Miller who topped the regional charts with 52 wickets at a phenomenal average of 8.05.

“I think the senior batters didn't come up trumps for us this year and I'm sure they are disappointed about that”.

Jamaica won six straight matches all ending inside three days during the preliminary stage of the competition.

However, the Jamaicans were knocked out in the semi-finals after succumbing to a three wicket loss to the struggling Trinidad and Tobago at Sabina Park.

"Against Trinidad it is pretty obvious...we didn't make as many runs as we could have in that second innings. After getting a lead of about 70 (runs) we needed to consolidate and get a decent total” said Miller.

"If we had gotten anything close to what we got in the first innings (246 runs), we would have won the game easily”.

Jamaica team manager Donovan Senior said the frail top-order batting left the lower-order players with too much work to often.

"We just didn't make enough runs..,” Senior told the Jamaica Observer.

“The lower order batting usually comes good, but it didn't happen in this game (versus T&T)”.

Chairman of selectors Courtney Daley says the batting was the major flop and says Miller should have been brought into the attack earlier to partner the rampaging Bernard.

"The batting wasn't good at all and that caused it (the loss) ... We were always behind the eighth ball throughout the tournament,” said Daley.

"But I think that possibly if we had done differently with the use of the bowlers we could have come out better”.

Jamaica also missed out on retaining the Regional Super50 title, after a semi-final defeat to the eventually winners Windward Islands last month.

Team unity lifted Barbados to new first class title says captain

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Monday, 13 May 2013 13:34

Captain Kirk Edwards says Barbados was able to achieve championship success in regional four-day cricket this year because of team unity and hard work.  

The Bajans were crowned new champions after demolishing Trinidad and Tobago by an innings and 22 runs in the final at Kensington Oval on Saturday.

Barbados has been presented with the Headley-Weekes trophy, symbol of regional first-class cricket supremacy, after ending Jamaica’s dominance which ran for five consecutive years.

“For our success, it is just playing together. It was a good team effort. When one guy does not come well, the other guy tends to put up his hand and come well, so we play as a unit and we tend to work together,” said Edwards.

“Every day cannot be my day, every day cannot be another guy’s day. Whoever day it is, we tend to celebrate that for that guy”.

Needing to erase a deficit of 259 runs, Trinidad and Tobago were dismissed for 237 in their second innings, about half hour after the lunch interval on the third day.

Barbados’ triumph was the country’s 21st since the West Indies first class competition was first sponsored in 1966.

It was also  their fourth consecutive victory and 11th over T&T in their last 21 first class encounters.

T&T won six, and there were four drawn matches during that period.

 “It (victory) feels great,”the Bajan captain declared.

“We feel good because we have been working hard and we have been getting a lot of stick so, it is always good to come out with a positive result”.

Barbados wins 4-day WICB tournament

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Friday, 10 May 2013 15:50

Listless Trinidad and Tobago slumped to a heavy innings and 22-run loss in the Regional Four-Day final, to hand Barbados their 21st first class title on Saturday.

Starting the penultimate day at Kensington Oval on 140 for four and requiring nothing short of a miracle to stay alive in the contest, T&T folded meekly for 237, 25 minutes after lunch to complete a miserable outing and finish the season with little to show for their efforts.

Attacking opener Lendl Simmons converted his overnight 111 into a top score of 140 while Stephen Katwaroo got 34, but the lower order was devoid of fight as T&T lost their last six wickets for 97 runs.

Seamer Javon Searles was the pick of the bowlers, grabbing three for 31 while impressive fast bowler Miguel Cummins added one to his three from overnight to finish with four for 75.

He was voted Man-of-the-Match for his nine-wicket match haul.

T&T captain Denesh Ramdin said afterward his side’s campaign had suffered because of the loss of key personnel, with the new players not performing up to scratch.

“It was an up and down season and we had to keep chopping and changing players, some going and some coming. We did not get that balance in our batting department so we were always struggling to put 200 runs on the board and our bowlers have done it throughout the season for us,” the West Indies wicketkeeper said.

“This is [one of the few times] we have gotten over 220 runs for the season. It is something we have to think about and we have to go back to our drawing board. The top five or six batters need to come to the party. They didn’t come consistently as we wanted them too in this tournament.”

He added: “Well played to Simmons this game. He got a hundred but coming from 260 behind it is a hard task to overcome that.”

Barbados coach Hendy Springer, meanwhile, was understandably elated by his team’s triumph.

“It feels great after you have completed a season after the kind of start we had, win a trophy and still look around and see some of the young guys improve as well. That is the definition of success for me,” he said.

“We had guys that were willing or fight, willing to prove their worth and that was important.”

With the script written since the first day after T&T’s batting meltdown, the result appeared all but a formality when the visitors resumed the third day still 119 runs adrift of making Barbados bat again.

Simmons picked up where he left off on Friday, slamming the second ball of the day from pacer Kemar Roach through cover for four, and repeating the shot in the bowler’s next over.

He stretched his fifth wicket stand with Ramdin to 83 before losing his skipper, lbw to Roach for 18 in the seventh over of the morning.

Ramdin never suggested permanence and had been put down at first slip by Sulieman Benn off Roach in the previous over on 17.

Simmons continued to play freely, carting Cummins over long off for his eighth six, as he added 25 for the sixth wicket with the diminutive Katwaroo, to hold up Barbados’ advance.

Running out of ideas, Barbados turned to part-time seamer Jonathan Carter and he got the breakthrough, having Simmons caught at the wicket, 50 minutes before lunch.

All told, the right-hander faced 114 balls in nearly three hours at the crease, and also counted 12 fours.

Katwaroo, who had batted cautiously for nearly an hour-and-a-half with three fours, then suffered a wild rush of blood in the final over before lunch and skied Searles to Roach at mid-off.

Perched on 217 for seven at the interval, T&T’s tail collapsed swiftly on resumption, leaving Imran Khan unbeaten on 14.