… staying on as coach of the CCC
PORT Of SPAIN, Trinidad – Former West Indies captain Floyd Lamonte Reifer is set to bow out of regional cricket after this year’s season.
Management of the Combined Campuses and Colleges (CCC) team which Reifer has represented for the past seven years yesterday issued a statement saying that the 2014 West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) regional cricket season will see the brilliant player/coach of CCC, and legendary Barbados and West Indies cricketer at that level for the last time. Although Reifer, a left-handed middle- order batsman who took up the role of player/coach for the CCC in 2007 on his retirement from the Barbados national team, will be playing his last season for the CCC, he will continue as its coach, working alongside the West Indies icon and former fast bowler Curtly Ambrose.
Reifer has had a distinguished career at the national and regional levels, and was called to duty by the WICB to lead the senior regional team in 2009 at the international level during a crisis moment in West Indies cricket.
Known for his unruffled demeanour, and intense competitive spirit, he has led the CCC to two finals in five years (the 2011 four-day tournament and 2013 Super50 competition) and has served to establish the CCC as a formidable force in regional competitions.
Reifer made a huge impact with the bat in the 2009 WICB four-day competition when he scored an impressive 1 002 runs (average 47.71) with three (3) centuries and five (5) half-centuries. During that year CCC defeated all of the traditional regional teams – except Jamaica – and secured its reputation as a force to be reckoned with.
Professor Sir Hilary Beckles, conceptualiser of the CCC project and founder and first chair of the WICB Sagicor Cricket High Performance Centre at the Cave Hill campus of the UWI, where he is principal, stated that “Floyd was asked to build out the CCC within the model established by Sir Frank Worrell; having a senior motivational player on the field, teaching tactics and strategies as the game evolves.”
He added: “This development and learning approach was fully realised by Reifer, and has so far produced many quality players for national teams as well as the West Indies.”
Sir Hilary commended the inspirational player for “an excellent performance”, and noted that “as the CCC looks for his successor, it will continue to be served as coach by Reifer”. (Barbados Advocate article)