In Barbados with the compliments of: Igloo Ice Cream, GT&T, Papi’s Supermarket, Oasis Water and Noble House Seafoods Limited.
Guyana will face the Combined Campuses and Colleges (CCC) team in their second round encounter of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) four-day competition at the 3W’s Oval, Cave Hill, Barbados ground from today with both teams looking to get their first points from this fixture.
It will be the first match for the university students and the second for the team from the Land of Many Waters.
The Guyanese started this year’s competition on the wrong foot, losing to the Windward Islands by an innings and 147 runs inside three days at the Queen’s Park ground in Grenada with only skipper Travis Dowlin’s first innings half century being any innings of note.
That performance should be at the forefront of their collective consciousness as they look to get their noses in front.
Coordinator of sports at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Roland Butcher is hoping that his charges will do likewise.
Guyana will look to openers Krishna Arjune and Shemroy Barrington to give them a good start, something which the middle order led by Dowlin, Leon Johnson, Narsingh Deonarine and Royston Crandon, can build upon.
Now is as good a time as any, to give all rounder Christopher Barnwell his first game at the four day level for Guyana.
His type of game would add and not take away anything from the team, as the pitch at Cave Hill is expected to provide lots of bounce for the fast bowlers.
His batting should also support the middle order and with the exclusion of West Indies players Sewnarine Chattergoon, Ramnaresh Sarwan and Shivnarine Chanderpaul, an extra batsman especially someone like Barnwell would be needed.
Darwin Christian retains his place behind the stumps and whilst his glove-work has improved leaps and bounds, his performance in front of the wicket has not.
The spinners in Devendra Bishoo, who took a “five for” when he played against the same opponents in last year’s tournament, and Veerasammy Permaul will be expected to do the bulk of the bowling with support from pacers, Barnwell, Esaun Crandon and Brendon Bess.
But the students are no pushovers as was evident when the two sides met in the regional limited overs competition last year in Guyana.
In that encounter, opener Rommel Currency struck an unbeaten 102 and even though they lost the game, the students showed they can be a force to reckon with, as they scored a comprehensive victory of the Windward Islands.
They now need to translate that performance to the longer version and according to Butcher, they have been doing such with early preparation which commenced last year and included several practice matches.
Apart from Currency, the CCC team can count on the experience of former West Indies and Barbados middle order batsman Floyd Reifer, skipper Simon Jackson, Nikolai Parris and opener Ramnarine Chattergoon.
The bowling will rest on the shoulders of Jamal Noel who grabbed 6-101 the last time these two met, Kevin Mc Lean, Omar Phillips, Kavesh Kantasingh and Ryan Austin who bowled his fingers out when Barbados completed their second double-double in 2005 under the captaincy of Courtney Browne.
The toss would be a vital factor in this encounter, as both teams look to surge to front and get amongst the points in this year’s competition which is being played on a home and away system.