‘We had a pretty good year’

-says GCA president Roger Harper

President of the George-town Cricket Association (GCA) Roger Harper yesterday said that despite a few minor setbacks and challenges encountered throughout 2013, the year remained a successful year for the association and he sees greater strides being made in the forthcoming year.

The former Guyana and West Indies all-rounder during an exclusive interview with Stabroek Sports, spoke about the GCA’s past year in their continued endeavour to develop cricket in and around the Georgetown district along with future aims.

Regarding the various tournaments held during 2013 some affected by weather and others by venue availability, Harper adamantly said:“We had a pretty good year and we were able to meet all of our objectives.”

He also acknowledged that despite not being able to complete tournaments such as the Brainstreet Under-15 and the New Building Society (NBS) 40 overs-a-side U-19 tournaments due to the weather, they were still happy about the progress made with the other competitions held such as the Banks U13, Noble House Seafood’s second-division and Hadi’s Mall Incorporated first-division tournaments.

Roger Harper
Roger Harper

Apart from the aforementioned competitions the GCA recently embarked on a mission to bowl off their highly anticipated Carib Beer sponsored first-division T20 competition which had a few games played but was interrupted by rain. Harper hoped that upon resumption next year the competition will be successfully completed as the players were excited to compete.

From a fiscal aspect, the GCA President pointed out that the association depends on the various sponsors who greatly assist in the launching of their respective tournaments, noting that… “The sponsors were tremendous” throughout the year.

“The GCA is a not a profit-making organistaion. We do not need a big bank balance as long as we can do what we can to develop the sport and the young players we can consider ourselves successful,” Harper added.

Harper touched on the important phases of the year explaining that all of the tournaments were important, sighting the promotion of the youths and their respective programmes along with the seniors as one of the key areas of cricket development.

However the availability of grounds along with the interference from the weather affected the first-division levels and their tournaments was a critical blow for the GCA. With this he admitted that they were still fortunate for the amount of success they had in running off the other tournaments and noted that “no one is in control of the weather “.

Nevertheless the President was hopefully that the New Year will be more conducive for play and it will allow the young players who missed out on completing their tournament’s this year to showcase their talents in the upcoming legs.

With a few more days left before the breaking of the New Year, Harper duly stated that the GCA will continue in their efforts to build on their achievements and to successfully continue their works in the grooming and churning out of the sport’s next ambassadors.