The Barbados Cricket Association (BCA) has made an appeal to the established cricket clubs in the island and corporate Barbados to assist with the development of female cricketers.
Making this appeal at Thursday night’s awards presentation ceremony of the 2011 Iris Walker Competition, was Patricia Greenidge, BCA board member and chairperson of the women’s cricket committee.
Greenidge told the gathering that this year’s tournament was bigger and better than last year’s and organisers were hoping that next year’s would be even bigger and better once the necessary assistance was obtained.
Last year three teams took part. This year there were four teams.
The competition was broken down into two segments: a T-20 and a 40-over competition. Remarkably, the team placings were the same for both tournaments. The Angela Harris Tridents were the winners of both tournaments, with Pat Whittaker Pride in the runner-up position. The Alfred Campbell Sagicor UWI Blackbirds and the Gloria Gill Dolphins finished third and fourth, respectively.
“We are making a special appeal to members of corporate Barbados and the established cricketing clubs in the island to assist the BCA with this expensive undertaking,” Greenidge said.
“This year we outfitted the teams and sponsored both competitions which was a costly exercise. Next year we would like to expand the competition to include as many as six teams in an effort to make [it] more interesting, exciting and played over a longer period of time.”
With the exception of the Alfred Campbell Sagicor UWI Blackbirds, the teams and tournaments were named after prominent female cricketers of the past. Campbell was instrumental in getting the competition started a couple years ago. There were a number of outstanding performances in both tournaments. Fifteen-year-old Shaquana Quinton was outstanding with the bat. She was the only player to get over the 300 run-barrier in both forms of the game as well as the only person to score in excess of 150 runs.
In outlining the plans for the Barbados team selection for the upcoming West Indies regional tournament, Greenidge said that following the successful completion of this year’s tournament, 22 players were selected to a training squad which will commence training on Mondays Wednesdays and Fridays from this week until the end of July.
Training will include gym work, net practice, fielding practice and sessions with a personal trainer. At the end of June the squad will be reduced to about 18 players of which 14 will be selected to represent Barbados in the West Indies tournament which begins this year in Barbados from August 4 to 15. The four remaining players will be the reserves.
Greenidge also made an appeal to girls interested in playing cricket to contact members of the current Barbadian team or the BCA at Kensington Oval.
