2010 Airtel Champions League …
Says Calvin Roberts
ABOUT one month ago, inspirational captain of the Guyana T20 cricket team and West Indies middle order batsman, Ramnaresh Sarwan, had told Chronicle Sport he is looking forward to the national team’s encampment period ahead of their departure for South Africa.
According to Sarwan, he wishes to hit the ground running hard when they arrive to contest the 2010 Airtel Champions League, having earned the right to do so as the West Indies representatives, following their nail-biting win over Barbados in the Regional T20 competition.

Judging from the performance of the team in their two practice matches against self-proclaimed regional T20 champions Trinidad and Tobago (T&T) and Sarwan’s comments after the win in the second match, Guyana will hit the ground running hard when they arrive sometime next week. They leave next Monday.
Prior to contesting the Caribbean T20 tournament, coach Rabindranauth Seeram said the bowling department was very weak, but they managed to defeat all those who oppose them to win their second Regional T20 tournament, following the historic Stanford victory back in 2006.
It was the same weak bowling attack minus Regional MVP Devendra Bishoo who limited T&T to 150 in the first match, with veteran off-spinner Lennox Cush continuing from where he left off in the Regional tournament, by giving away a miserly 16 runs from his four overs.
The 35-year-old Cush who recently guided the United States of America to the ICC Division 3 playoffs, received valuable assistance from his Malteenoes Sports Club (MSC) teammate Steven Jacobs who took 4-23 from three overs, before he was suspended by umpire Clyde Duncan for an above the waist no-ball, which was questionable.
Esaun Crandon bowled well in tandem with Cush, while debutant fast bowler Paul Wintz came back from a miserable first over which went for 17 runs, to give away six from his next two overs.
With the never-say-die attitude of the support staff, Guyana were able to restrict the opposition to a feasible total, but bad batting prevented the home team from recording victory.
Sarwan admitted this after the convincing win in the second match last Sunday, where once again the bowling minus Cush and Bishoo restricted, and later on destroyed, the opposition’s batting.
To say that Guyana’s preparation under the supervision of Seeram and former West Indies all-rounder Roger Harper is not going well would be an understatement, as those who were gathered at the Guyana National Stadium for the weekend matches, left with their appetites whetted.
Despite the loss on Saturday, the local cricket-starving public who packed the venue to its capacity, returned the following day and cheered every run, ball fielded and catch taken, as if their champion team had won the ICC World Cup.
Sarwan led from the front with the bat, with valuable support from Travis Dowlin, Christopher Barnwell and the nation’s new batting sensation 19-year-old Jonathan Foo who made amends for his blunders the previous night.
With the sounds of Dave Martin’s ‘Not a Blade of Grass’ emanating from the party mound as they took the field, the team from the Land of Many Waters atoned for their mistakes by trouncing and at the same time maintaining their authority over the Twin Island Republic team, with a 49-run victory.
To my mind, they are in perfect shape and condition to challenge the world’s best clubs in the African continent.
What we need to do is rally behind and around our local champions who, according to Joseph ‘Reds’ Perreira, are the genuine T20 champions of the Caribbean and whoever wishes to debate that has no knowledge of the gentleman’s game.
The Government of Guyana, led by His Excellency President Bharrat Jagdeo, has made the first step by offering the team full sponsorship to the tune of G$20M, along with a campaign to further sensitise the public of the team’s road to South Africa.
This involves a jingle, television and radio advertisements, flyers and banners and no stone is being left unturned, as they seek to notify the public of their champions’ endeavours over the next three weeks.
But as is customary with the sporting public, some doubting Thomases are finding it heartening to downplay the team’s chances against the much bigger guns in the Sachin Tendulkar’s Mumbai Indians and Jacques Kallis’ Royal Bangalore Challengers.
No other team deserves to be there than Guyana.
They have played the best cricket in the Regional T20, a fact admitted by T&T’s skipper Daren Ganga in a post-match interview with the media following his team’s defeat in the second match last Sunday.
“They played the better cricket tonight and deservedly they won. They have been doing so over the past few weeks, starting with the Regional T20 competition and deservedly so, they are going to South Africa.”
“While there, they will be representing not only Guyana, but also the West Indies on the whole and I would like to urge all Guyanese and every West Indian wherever you are, to rally around them.
“When they do good, it will not only be Guyana that has done well, but the West Indies at large and we need to give them our support,” stated Ganga.
Why does it have to take a foreigner to encourage us to rally around our own team, at a time like this?
They belong to Guyana. They have played their heart and soul for this country time and time again, bringing us joy and putting a smile on some of our faces, commencing with their win in the inaugural KFC Regional championships and spreading onto the 2006 Stanford 20/20 tournament.
T&T’s David Rudder sang ‘Rally around the West Indies’. I am no calypsonian or soca artiste, but I would like to say to all and sundry, young and old even hot and cold, ‘Let’s rally around the Guyana T20 team now and forever more.’