Chairman of the Competitions Committee of the Georgetown Cricket Association (GCA) Shaun Messiah yesterday lamented the unavailability of cricket grounds in the City for non-cricketing events.
At a time when the rain seems to have abated there is a backlog of matches dating back to last year due to clubs renting their grounds for softball matches and other events, thus depriving the GCA of completing their competitions.
Shaun Messiah
“This weekend for instance we were told that Everest has rented their ground for both Saturday and Sunday, while Bourda is unavailable on Sunday. MYO is also unavailable. This is making it difficult for us to complete our fixtures on schedule and we have a first division competition from last year that has six rounds remaining,” Messiah stated.
The 42-year-old, who still plays at the first division level for Transport Sports Club (TSC), says his own club has been affected by the completion of fixtures on time before and there are trees growing on the TSC ground which has not hosted cricket since the other facilities have been upgraded over two years ago.
“Our team practices at the YMCA ground and once the TSC surface is firm enough weeding of the ground should commence. We (GCA) don’t have access to grounds like Queens College since we don’t have a Curator to send there,” Messiah stated.
“The bad weather and the unavailability of the grounds have combined to put a spoke in the wheel of our competitions but we are using whichever grounds we can,” Messiah stated.
“While the clubs have the right to choose what events they rent their grounds for in an effort to sustain funds for maintenance, they should be reminded that they have cricket teams playing in the competitions and most of them are cricket clubs,” the GCA official concluded. (Sean Devers)