The Barbados Cricket Association (BCA) is preparing to launch a semi-professional league, a move expected to significantly benefit local players, according to a report from Barbados Today.
The announcement was made by BCA President Calvin Hope while speaking to members of the media following the departure of the West Indies Under-19 team for the ICC Cricket World Cup.
“We will be paying the players, people who play cricket at the elite level; they work otherwise, so it’s not straight professional. We want to bring some seriousness, some more incentives to the players and to encourage a professional set-up that can grow for the future,” the BCA head was quoted as saying.
“Long are the days where people just come and turn up and play at that level who want to play professional cricket, so we’ll try to put a system in place to prepare them for that.”
According to Hope, the association is aiming for the domestic season to start on April 4, but the details of the semi-pro league are still being finalised.
“Well, I don’t want to give too much on that right now, because we’re working out the numbers and that kind of thing, I mean this is where it calls for partnership. Right now I am inviting the private sector to join us and cricket means everything to this country. We want to promote peace through cricket and if you want to coin it as ‘P at the crease’, we want cricket to play a bigger and better role in Barbadian society.”
As part of its grassroots development, the BCA late last year sent an Under-13 team to Guyana for a five-match bilateral series, which the Bajans won 3-2 after trailing 0-2 after the first two games.
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