News

WICB President: Great job by the Caribbean!

18/05/10

President of the West Indies Cricket Board, Dr Julian Hunte, has lauded the people of the Caribbean who played a role in the successful staging of the International Cricket Council’s World T20 Tournament, which ended at Kensington Oval in Barbados on Sunday.

Dr Hunte said one of the major highlights of the Tournament was the spectacular spectator support of the matches played in Guyana, St Lucia, St Kitts and Barbados. He added that the event was very well organized and congratulated the work of the regional event team, led by Robert Bryan.

“I want to thank everyone who contributed, whether great or small, for a job well done. I also want to thank the ICC for giving us this opportunity to stage such a prestigious event. It is really heart warming that we pulled it off in such spectacular fashion. The people of the region have every reason to be proud today. They have done the Caribbean proud and they have done West Indies cricket proud. I hope that we will continue in this way when we have the West Indies Cricket Board Tournament in July.”

Dr Hunte added: “The thing that is most important about this Tournament is that we have laid to rest the perceived ghost of the Cricket World Cup 2007. Robert Bryan and his team took over the job which was started by Ernest Hilaire and they did a fantastic job in putting together the 2010 World T20 Tournament. It was truly magnificent. I think in terms of content and atmosphere it is the Tournament to beat.”

The two-week show ended with England beating Australia to win the men’s title and Australia getting the better of New Zealand to win the women’s title in front a capacity crowd on Sunday.

“I want to especially thank the Caribbean public for their support, for coming out with their drums and other instruments which gave it that true Caribbean flavour that we know of and that is characteristic of this side of the world. It was also great to see so many visiting fans joining in to learn how to doing it the Windies way.

Dr Hunte also commented on the performances of the West Indies teams. The Windies girls reached the semi-finals for the first time while the men bowed out at the Super Eights stage.

“I am very pleased the women were able to show a tremendous amount of progress. We have moved up the rankings in the world which offers us the opportunity to play more regularly against the major teams in the world and get more exposure for our talented players. I want to thank all those persons involved in the development of women’s cricket up to now, and we as a Board want to ensure that women’s cricket is organized in a way to ensure its survives and grows in the region.”
He added: “I believe our men’s team is as a good as any but things just didn’t happen for us. I hope we are in a position that when we go to the Digicel Series with South Africa and other tournaments coming up, that the players get it together and bring joy to the people of the West Indies once more.”