BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, CMC – West Indies batting legend Desmond Haynes has backed this year’s Caribbean Premier League to be one of the best ever.
The 59-year-old, who serves as ambassador for the Barbados Tridents, said with the quality of overseas players and the well-balanced nature of the six franchises, the June 20 to July 26 tournament could prove to be the stand-out edition.
“I believe this could be the best Limacol CPL because looking at the teams I find that the teams are well balanced and all the teams are very competitive,” Haynes said.
“With those big stars coming to be a part of CPL I think it is good for the competition. Over the last couple of years, CPL has been very good in having some very balanced sides but as you know, cricket is played on the day.
“But looking at the teams on paper, you would think that this CPL will be the best one of the three.”
South Africa’s Jacques Kallis heads the list of overseas stars coming for the third edition of the CPL, with Sri Lanka’s Mahela Jayawardene and Lasith Malinga, England’s Kevin Pietersen and Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi also set to feature.
Despite the influx of stars, Haynes says he did not expect any one team to dominate the tournament, as success would also be down to team unity.
“All the teams are very competitive. You may look at one or two teams that do have some big names but a lot of the teams have good units and play together,” he pointed out.
“Take the Tridents for example, if it is one thing you can say about us is that we always play together, we gel well and everybody likes the leader.
“Polly (Kieron Pollard) has an influence on the team which makes everybody happy to be around him and we’ve got the senior players that don’t matter what you ask of them, these guys are willing to do it for the team.”
Barbados Tridents are the defending champions after beating Guyana Amazon Warriors in a highly charged final in St Kitts last August.
The two teams will feature in the curtain-raiser at Kensington Oval, the first of four matches that are expected to draw sell-out crowds.
Tridents will also take on 2013 champions Jamaica Tallawahs, last year’s semi-finalist Trinidad and Tobago Red Steel and new franchise, the St Kitts and Nevis Patriots.
Though the Tridents have lost the likes of Shakib al Hasan, Raymon Reifer and Kyle Mayers, Haynes believes his side still possessed enough firepower to threaten.
“We’ve also got some exciting young players in our midst, fellows who are interested in making sure that we retain the trophy and so far, looking at the Barbados Tridents, they look they will be force to be reckoned with even through some of the other teams have been strengthened with some big names,” Haynes contended.
“We have (Dilshan) Munaweera who is a very exciting opening batsman, and seeing him and Dwayne Smith opening the batting this season could be very exciting for crowds around the Caribbean. We’ve lost one or two players but we’ve got the likes of Shai Hope and we still haven’t seen the best of Jonathan Carter even though he did very well for us in the Champions League last year.
“We’ve got a lot of talent in our side but in T20 cricket you need that big of luck and you need to play together. You also need to think long and hard about how you’re going to go about your game so the planning is very important.”
The CPL features six franchises – Barbados Tridents, Jamaica Tallawahs, T&T Red Steel, St Lucia Zouks, Guyana Amazon Warriors and St Kitts & Nevis Patriots – competing in 33 matches.
