Four Caribbean schools are making their debut in the 25th Annual Sir Garfield Sobers International Schools’ Tournament 2011, while several former champions are making a return after a long break.
New Amsterdam of Guyana, Choiseul Secondary School from St Lucia as well as Trinidad’s Powergen Sports Club and Vishnu Boys’ School are all entering the tournament for the first time.
The three former local champions returning are Coleridge and Parry, the 1988 champions; Harrison College, the 1990 champions, and Ellerslie School, which won seven years later.
Queen’s College and Ipswich of England are also back.
During Thursday’s Press briefing at the Barbados Tourism Authority (BTA), consultant Morris Greenidge said there were 24 schools in this year’s competition.
The others are Lancaster Royal Grammar and Solihull from England; Xenon Academy and Top Level Academy from Guyana; Fatima College, Presentation College, Queen’s Park Coaching Club and St Mary’s College from Trinidad and Tobago; St Clair Dacon Secondary fromSt Vincent; Dominica Combined Schools and Antigua Combined.
The other local teams are the Barbados Cricket League, Combermere, The Lodge School and Lester Vaughan.
The schools will be divided into three zones. The winner of each zone and the next best team will advance to the semi-finals.
In honour of the 25th anniversary, several changes have been made to the tournament. Senior coach George Shepherd of the National Sports Council announced that the Alvin Burgess Memorial Award would be given to the Most Disciplined Team in the competition in perpetuity.
The Jim Andrews Memorial Award for the Most Disciplined Player has been awarded for several years.
The All-Star match, which featured the top players in the tournament, is now one of two festival T20 matches which will be played on July 19 at the Bridgefield ground,?St Thomas.
That match will start at 10 a.m., and the second, which starts at 2 p.m., will feature past players to be chosen by former Barbados and West Indies players Ian Bradshaw and Courtney Browne.
The tournament gets underway on Monday and the finals are slated for July 19 at Kensington Oval.
Winston Carter of the BTA urged the summer camps to make it a day for cricket as admission would be free.
He also thanked the sponsors, some of whom were present, for the continued support which made the tournament possible even as the costs of staging it continued to increase.
