WITH limited opportunities for major corporate investment in the Caribbean, Cricket West Indies (CWI) Chief Executive Officer Chris Dehring believes tapping further into the North American market could provide significant financial relief as CWI seeks to increase its revenues. 

Caribbean Cricket’s governing body is undergoing major restructuring, after revealing major financial challenges in September that have and will continue to affect its operations in the foreseeable future.

Salary cuts for international and domestic players, and the scrapping of several annual competitions are among the measures CWI has implemented so far.

Several stakeholders have called for greater government support but also increased investment from the private sector, pointing to the significant backing previously provided by companies such as Digicel and Sandals.

However, Jamaican Dehring says it’s become more difficult for regional corporate sponsors to commit millions of dollars to CWI’s teams and programmes.

“There’s an infrastructure-type barrier, and that is the scale of the Caribbean. Sports branding works best for new companies trying to establish a brand in a market that they wish to exploit,” he said on the Caribbean Cricket Podcast.

Source: Jamaica Observer

For so many years in the past I have been advocating that CWI is missing out on potential lucrative revenue opportunities by not tapping into the US and Canada cricket markets which are basically starving of cricket matches. I even pointed out that it would be useful for not only revenue attainment but also to provide international competitive experience for our young developing cricketers, many might not remember that King and others were found during a match in Canada.