FORMER president of the West Indies Players’ Association (WIPA) Dinanath Ramnarine has been described as hypocritical for his criticism of the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB) of which he is an ordinary board member.
And he has been advised by Manohar Ramsaran, an executive TTCB member to do the honourable thing and resign his position from the sport’s national body before going public with his baseless comments.
This after Ramnarine, who was replaced last year as WIPA president by Jamaican Wavell Hinds, told a local daily newspaper that he was confused by the TTCB’s stance on the recent removal of wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin as captain of the West Indies Test team ahead of their tour of Sri Lanka later this year.
Ramsaran, widely regarded as one of T&T best sports ministers said while Ramnarine is casting aspersions on the governance of the TTCB, he is displaying the same undesirable qualities he seeks to condemn.
“It is unethical and highly irresponsible to be a member of an organization and run to the media and air your views when there are processes within the organization to have your complaints and concerns properly addressed,” said Ramsaran.
Graeme Smith, the former South Africa captain who took charge of his country's Test fortunes as a callow 22-year-old in 2003, hopes that Jason Holder can put the team politics to one side when he takes over as West Indies' Test captain for the first time in Sri Lanka next month.
Holder, 23, was named as Denesh Ramdin's successor for the two-Test series that gets underway in Galle on October 14 after displaying impressive leadership credentials at the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand earlier this year. Coming only months after a pay dispute led to West Indies' withdrawal from their tour of India in October 2014 - a move that landed the WICB with a multimillion dollar bill for compensation which is still being thrashed out - the team battled back from an early defeat against Ireland to reach the quarter-finals, where they eventually lost to the finalists, New Zealand.
Despite his tender years, Holder has already received the endorsement of one of the region's greatest players, Brian Lara, who praised his "demeanour" during that tournament and likened his stature to that of a young Clive Lloyd.
ST JOHN’S, Antigua (CMC) – England’s Test tour of the Caribbean earlier this year proved a financial success, grossing US$73.2 million across the region, the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) announced on Wednesday.In a release, the WICB said the result of an Economic Impact Assessment had shown that the three Tests, which were played between April 13 and May 3, had realised a real “economic impact” of US$59.8 million. “The key outcomes of the Economic Impact Assessment which was conducted during the England Tour of the Caribbean earlier this year revealed that the region, as a whole, largely benefited from hosting the three Tests,” the WICB said. “The study revealed that generated gross expenditure related to the Tour was approximately US$73.2 million, of which the economic impact was US$59.8 million or 82 per cent of the generated gross expenditure. The lion’s share of this impact was driven by the spectators’ spend, i.e. US $50.1 million.” According to the report, the tour also pulled in 15 660 unique visitors, including 3 150 who used tour packages. In an analysis of the West Indies as an advertising brand, the report showed that there were “1 477 verbal mentions of West Indies as a ‘brand’ counted, generating a media value of US$1.1 million.” The report also showed that of the host venues for the Tests, Antigua received the largest amount of brand exposure with 40 per cent while Grenada gained 39 per cent. However, the Barbados Test which ended in three days gained only 21 per cent.
The Red Force has acquired all-rounder, Narsingh Deonarine for the 2015/2016 West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) Professional Cricket League season.
This was due to an agreement between the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board and Leeward Islands Cricket Association to swap the experienced Deonarine for Jamaican batsman Nkrumah Bonner who was drafted by the Red Force.
Deonarine became the top pick of the WICB Player Draft when selected by the Leeward Islands Hurricanes after declining a retainer contract by the Guyana Jaguars. The Guyanese all-rounder’s wife is Trinidadian and representing the Red Force allowed him to be with his family while competing at the regional level.
“I would like to thank the Leeward Islands Cricket Association for reaching an agreement which allows Narsingh to play for the Red Force and be with his family in Trinidad. Also I would like to commend Nkrumah on being receptive to the trade and we would like to wish him a successful season with the Hurricanes,” said Chief Executive Officer of the TTCB, Suruj Ragoonath.
This was revealed by WICB CEO Michael Muirhead who said there will now be a high performance programme that can be administered in any of the regional territories.
“Our director of cricket (Richard Pybus) revamped that whole programme in terms of how we do it,” Muirhead told the Express yesterday.
“Before, we had them (participants) in a classroom sometimes and it was like a curriculum. We are not doing it like that anymore. We are now identifying what needs to be done at specific points in time and coming up with a programme that can be administered in any territory. We are rolling it out right now.”
When the HPC was launched under the previous WICB administration led by Julien Hunte, it was geared towards refining the skills of some of the young promising cricketers from around the region and among the first class were newly appointed West Indies Test captain Jason Holder, wicketkeeper Shane Dowrich, batsman Rajindra Chandrika and fast bowler Shannon Gabriel, who are all part of the Test team for the upcoming tour of Sri Lanka.
