Pres­i­dent of the T&T Crick­et Board (TTCB) Az­im Bas­sarath was one of the men in­volved in the longest ever crick­et match ever played in T&T. It took a to­tal of sev­en weeks for the match to be com­plet­ed way back in 1996.

The clash was be­tween St Mary's Su­per­stars out of Moru­ga and Green Ar­row Unit­ed from Mt Stew­art in Princes Town. The game was for pro­mo­tion to the TTCB Na­tion­al Crick­et League Di­vi­sion II.

Back in those days, it was play-to-fin­ish to de­ter­mine who ad­vanced. The match was played on week­ends un­til there was a win­ner on at least first in­nings.

The game start­ed on Sat­ur­day, June 8, 1996, and af­ter a few hours play the rains came down. Green Ar­row bat­ting first clos­ing on 123/3. The fol­low­ing day, the crick­eters showed up at the venue, the San Fer­nan­do Tech­ni­cal In­sti­tute, on­ly to stay in­doors as the rain Gods had the fi­nal say.

The teams then trained dur­ing the week and re­turned the next Sat­ur­day for crick­et. They got in a full day's play, and at the end of it, Green Ar­rows had pro­gressed to 375/8. In the mean­time, Da­vanand Nans­ingh was un­beat­en on 187. The next day they got in enough ac­tion to see Nans­ingh get to his dou­ble hun­dred. Green Ar­row was fi­nal­ly bowled out for 432 and St Mary's be­gan their re­sponse. They fin­ished the day on 23/1, as the rain came in­ter­mit­tent­ly.

The next week­end's play was com­plete­ly washed out. The fol­low­ing week, the teams showed up again and by this time they were get­ting very frus­trat­ed. There was no play on Sat­ur­day and they got in a lit­tle ac­tion on Sun­day.

A month had now passed, and this match was still go­ing on. The fol­low­ing week­end the play­ers crossed their fin­gers and re­turned to play. No play on Sat­ur­day, the play­ers de­cid­ed to make a lime and used the time to in­dulge in some choice bev­er­ages and cur­ried duck.

The next day some of them showed up and could have re­al­ly done with a break, as they were not in the best of health af­ter down­ing one too many drinks the day be­fore.

The sun was out in its glo­ry and St Mary's Su­per­stars start­ed to bat again. They reached 100/1 be­fore rain again forced the aban­don­ment of the day's play.

Next week­end, rain no play as the play­ers showed up with some men short from one of the teams. Pa­tience grew thin as they just want­ed this match over with.

Week sev­en and there was fi­nal­ly play as St Mary's Su­per­stars were bowled out on the Sat­ur­day for 286, los­ing the match on first in­nings, which gave Green Ar­row the vic­to­ry and ad­vance­ment to the next play­off round against Casa Grande All Stars.

This match was card­ed for North East­ern Col­lege, and af­ter Green Ar­row went up there for three weeks, not a ball was bowled. They de­cid­ed to switch the match to the San Fer­nan­do Tech­ni­cal In­sti­tute and af­ter an­oth­er three weeks, Green Ar­row fi­nal­ly won the game and gained pro­mo­tion to Na­tion­al League Two.

To­ba­go crick­et bowls off Jan 26

The To­ba­go Crick­et As­so­ci­a­tion (TCA) will bowl off its do­mes­tic sea­son next week­end.

On Jan­u­ary 26, the com­pe­ti­tion will start with the in­tro­duc­tion of the Com­mu­ni­ty Shield fea­tur­ing the reign­ing Twen­ty/20 and 40-Overs win­ners in a bat­tle for top ho­n­ours which should set the tone for the rest of the sea­son.

This match, card­ed for the Canaan/Bon Ac­cord Recre­ation Ground, will be con­test­ed be­tween C&B Unit­ed (T20 cham­pi­ons) and Scar­bor­ough/Ma­son Hall (40-Overs ti­tle-hold­ers). The du­ra­tion of the match will be 30 overs per team.

On the fol­low­ing day, all reg­is­tered teams with the TCA will meet at Canaan/Bon Ac­cord Recre­ation Ground for an of­fi­cial open­ing of the sea­son fol­lowed by the an­nu­al Five Overs Knock­out Tour­na­ment.

The TCA is al­so pleased to an­nounce the re­turn of the Two-Day League con­test. How­ev­er, its rein­tro­duc­tion fol­low­ing a year’s break will take a fran­chise-like for­mat. The is­land will be di­vid­ed in­to four zones - East, West, North, and Cen­tral.

Coach­es have al­ready been ap­point­ed to each zone. The next step is the se­lec­tion of play­ers. There will be two rounds of match­es with teams play­ing on a home and away for­mat.

Pres­i­dent of the TCA, Ker­win John is op­ti­mistic of a very suc­cess­ful sea­son.

“It’s the di­rec­tion the crick­et­ing world has tak­en,” John said, de­scrib­ing the Two- Day League as very im­por­tant for the de­vel­op­ment of the young play­ers in To­ba­go.

He ac­knowl­edged that the com­pe­ti­tion is back with a twist and added that the clubs and play­ers are ex­cit­ed and the changes have the full back­ing of his as­so­ci­a­tion.

He al­so said that each zone will have to field an Un­der-17 team which will play lim­it­ed overs match­es si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly with the se­niors. The league will al­so serve as tri­als for the se­lec­tion of the To­ba­go se­nior team.

Team lists in­clu­sive of man­ag­er and coach will be re­leased in the week lead­ing up to the league’s open­ing round on Feb­ru­ary 2, John an­nounced.

The TCA al­so ex­pressed their grat­i­tude to the To­ba­go House As­sem­bly's (THA) Di­vi­sion of Sport and Youth Af­fairs for its con­tin­ued sup­port in the prepa­ra­tion of the play­ing venues.

Pris­ons ar­rest Cen­tral Sports.

Pris­ons crick­et club cre­at­ed two up­sets on the sec­ond day of ac­tion of the UWI UNI­COM T20 Tour­na­ment, get­ting past Cen­tral Sports and Munroe Road at the UWIS­PEC in St Au­gus­tine.

In the first match, Cen­tral Sports bat­ting first scored 154 all out with Vis­han Jagges­sar scor­ing 51 off 24 balls and Kamil Pooran 24. Ri­car­do Ram­lo­gan bowl­ing for Pris­ons grabbed 3/21, and there were two wick­ets for Jalanie Seales and Narindra Bridge­lal.

Pris­ons bat­tled man­ful­ly with Ravi Khan lead­ing the way. He scored 78 off 52 balls and kept the in­nings to­geth­er. With wick­ets falling around him, he kept the score­board tick­ing to the ex­tent that his team got over the line with one wick­et to spare.

Pris­ons were not fin­ished yet, as they came up against Munroe Road next and took care of them as well. Munroe Road got to 140/8 with Takeem Lowe hit­ting a mag­nif­i­cent 86 off 55 balls. Bridge­lal grabbed two wick­ets and Mikel Fred­er­icks al­so took two.

Khan then showed up against to smack 37 off 25 balls to lead Pris­ons home at 141/6 with two overs and two balls to spare. Bridge­lal then came good with the bat scor­ing an un­beat­en 18 in the win.

UWI UNI­COM T20 SCORES

Cen­tral Sports – 154 all out (19.2) (Vis­han Jagges­sar 51, Kamil Pooran 24, Ri­car­do Ram­lo­gan 3/21, Jalanie Seales 2/37, Narindra Bridge­lal 2/38) vs Pris­ons 155/9 (19.4) (Ravi Khan 78, Jalanie Seales 20, Kissoon­dath Ma­gram 3/18, Al Small 2/24) - Pris­ons win by 1 wkt

Man of the Match – Ravi Khan

Munroe Road 140/8 (20) (Takeem Lowe 86, Naren­dra Bridge­lal 2/20, Mikel Fred­er­icks 2/24) vs Pris­ons – 141/6 (17.4) (Ravi Khan 37, An­dre Mo­hammed 26, Naren­dra Bridge­lal 18no, Law­son Ram­lal 2/23). Pris­ons win by 4 wk­ts.

Man of the Match – Naren­dra Bridge­lal

Munroe Road – 128 all out (18.1) (Akeem Al­varez 69, Kissoon­dath Ma­gram 3 /4, Rakesh Ma­haraj 3/15) vs Cen­tral Sports 129/2 (16.2) (Ky­orn Ot­t­ley 64no, Al Small 35no, Kern Math­e­son 2/35). Cen­tral Sports win by 8 wk­ts.

Man of the Match – Ky­orn Ot­t­ley