Young players for Bermuda

WEST Indies players Denesh Ramdin, Ravi Rampaul and Ryan Hurley are in a 14-member Clico Preysal squad heading to Bermuda this month for a ten-day pre-season training tour.

Fast bowler Rampaul, who returned home last week from a four-week scholarship at the elite Cricket Australia-Commonwealth Bank Centre of Excellence in Australia, will use the tour as his return to some level of competitive cricket, following injury. West Indies Test wicket-keeper Ramdin and the off-spinning allrounder Hurley, who played nine One-Day Internationals for the West Indies during 2003 and 2004 are among the key players in the squad for the tour that begins on September 17.

Trinidad and Tobago middle-order batsman Shazam Babwah will captain the team that will also include fast bowler Keegan Roy and off-spinner Vishan Jagessar, who both contested the TCL Group West Indies tournament in Guyana.

Meanwhile, former regional umpire Camal Basdeo has been appointed the first CEO of Clico Preysal, effective September 1, 2006.

It is the first time the club has hired a CEO, and it signals the club’s intention to become at least a semi-professional outfit by 2008.

Basdeo was also elected as the club’s secretary at the annual general meeting held on Sunday.

Tony Harford was elected unopposed for his fourth two-year-term as chairman of the Central-based club, with co-founder Manzur Baksh as vice-chairman.

Clico Preysal has won 26 titles since being sponsored by Clico in 1998, in all age groups.

In 2006, the club won the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board inaugural Twenty/20 championship and took the East/West Under-15 title for the first time.

CMC