West Demerara Cricket Association 2022 Review…

By Sean Devers
TWENTY-SIX-year-old National wicketkeeper/batter Kemol Savory was the outstanding player for the West Demerara Cricket Association (WDCA) for 2022.

Playing for West Demerara Police, Savory, who has two fifties in nine Regional 50-over games, slammed 189 against Cornelia Ida before scoring 120 against Windsor Forest in the Odyssey Tours’ 50-Over Competition.

Savory, who also participates in GCA cricket for Police, was on National duty and was only available for two matches so far.

Windsor Forest captain, Aditya Kadarnauth scored 156 runs including 102 against Leonora and also has taken eight wickets so far
Ushardave Balgobin made an unbeaten 105 for CI against Windsor Forest while Zeeburg’s Ricardo Poloram, rated as the most pugnacious batter in West Demerara, clobbered 96 against Leonora. Malcolm Hubbard and Renaldo Renee scored two fifties.

Off-spinner Anil Sookdeo is the leading wicket-taker so far with 12 wickets from two matches in the tournament, which attracted 12 teams.

On November 11, the Royalty Vibes Sound System T20 Tournament was launched and 16 teams will participate.

New WDCA president Troy Khan disclosed what is happening with Cricket on the West side.

“Well I can only speak from when we took over on March 2, 2022. Honestly … West Demerara’s main challenge at present is infrastructure and grounds.

To-date between the boundaries of Meten-Meer-Zorg, West Coast to Wales on the West Bank of Demerara there is no proper complete cricket facility,
Maybe, for this reason some of our players are plying their trade in the City” Khan continued.

“I know the Government has been upgrading a few of these grounds but a lot more needs to be done… not just about erecting a building.

It’s very costly for clubs to foot bills for almost everything to play a game, from cutting the ground, getting the pitch prepared … and this has been happening for years” said Khan, who played for the Meten-Meer-Zorg Cricket Club, the club where he grew up.

“In nine months I think we have achieved 85 percent of what we set out to achieve and that was to have cricket played at the Under-15, U-17 and U-19 levels.

“Our senior tournament which is almost at the semi-final stage is the best I have ever witnessed since the days of Seeram and Asgarally.

“We have like five batters already scoring hundreds and quite a few bowlers doing really well with the ball.

“But most pleasing was to have our Under-15 captain Pameshwar Ram in the Demerara team and our Under-17 captain Nityanand Mathura in Guyana team. Sachin Balgobin was also in the Guyana Under-19 team,” added Khan, who represented the West Demerara Under-19 and Senior levels.

In August the GCB made a significant donation of cricket gear to the WDCA and Khan said WDCA was happy to receive the donation.

“We believe that it will go a long way in assisting us to effectively carry out our coaching education programme. Players’ gear is needed and a number of players will now have the liberty to use the gear and explore the level of skills they possess in the game.” explained Khan, who played first division cricket for the Police in Georgetown from 1991 to 2001.

“There is a lot that we want to do in 2023. Our focus is to get the school cricket programme on stream again and it’s very important to have our First Division teams compete right up there with the other teams.