Johnson joins Tamar Lambert as only Captains with 3 Regional FC titles in a row

Apr 29, 2017 Sports

By Sean Devers
At 31, Leon Johnson is the most successful Guyana Captain, winning three of the 10 First-Class titles won by this Country in Regional cricket, bettering great Guyanese leaders like Clive Lloyd, Roger Harper and Carl Hooper

Leon Johnson leads his team off the after Guyana won its third consecutive title at Providence. (Sean Devers photo)

who have two each.
Lloyd (1975 & ’83), Harper (1987 & 1993), Hooper (1998 shared with L/Wards & 2002) and Johnson (2015, 2016 & 2017) are Guyana’s most successful leaders at the Regional First-Class level.
Rohan Kanhai led Guyana to its first First-Class title in 1973 when the team won the Shell Shield and is the only other Guyanese to win a title and Guyana’s three titles in a row is only bettered by Barbados and Jamaica.
Barbados dominated Regional Cricket in the 1970s and 80s and has the most First-Class titles (21) but none since Courtney Browne led them the 2003 and 2004 Carib Beer titles after Sir Garfield Sobers led Barbados to the first two titles since sponsored Regional First-Class officially began in the 1966.
When Johnson won championship honours for Guyana last year he became the first Guyanese leader to win back-to-back titles and now joins Jamaica Tamar Lambert as the only person to win a hat-trick of titles.
Lambert, however has won five of Jamaica’s 15 titles from 2009 to 2013 making him the most successful captain in the West Indies but never had the opportunity to play for the West Indies.
Chris Gayle won the 2008 Carib Beer Cup to give Jamaica the record of six consecutive titles.
After Lloyd won the 1975 Shell Shield, under David Holford’s Captaincy Barbados shared the 1976 title with Trinidad & Tobago and won the next four after that in successive years.
Holder’s three titles during that five-year Championship winning streak leading the team in 1977 and 1979 with Vanburn Holder being the Skipper in 1978, while off-spinner Albert Padmore was Captain in 1980.
Sir Vivian Richards, who never lost a series, had only two First-Class titles as Captain winning his first title in 1981 for the Combined Islands and his second in the 1990 Red Stripe Cup to give the Leeward Islands its first title.
Jonhson’s Jaguars went for 18 matches without a loss since Barbados beat them in 2014, an unbeaten streak that was broken by the Leewards in the second round of this season last November. They rebounded from that loss in St Kitts and carried their unbeaten streak to seven before it was broken in the last game in the 2017 season again by the Leewards who finished last this year despite being the only team to beat Guyana in 28 matches.
Johnson was rewarded for becoming the only Guyanese to win consecutive First-Class titles and for being the tournament’s leading runs scorer last season by copping the Sportsman of the year Award.
In 2005 when he led the Guyana U-19s to championship honors in Grenada and became the only Guyanese to score a double century in Regional U-19 cricket he was named junior Sportsman of the year.
Johnson is the only person to be named both Junior and Senior Sportsman of the year in their career.