Kerwin John is settling in for another two-year term as Tobago Cricket Association (TCA) president and his main focus will be on youth development. John was re-elected unopposed for a fourth consecutive term at the TCA’s annual general meeting (AGM) which took place at Calder Hall Community Centre in Scarborough on Saturday.
In accepting the presidency, John said bright days are ahead for cricket on the island while thanking the membership for their continued confidence in him.
“It’s always exciting to know the cricketing fraternity in Tobago has that much confidence in you and your performance over the past six years so that they see it fit to put you back in office and not just back in office, but unopposed,” John told the Guardian Media Sports.
Three new executive members were also elected unopposed including Farouk Yathali, who replaced Neil Beckles as the first vice president while Earl Arthur took up the position of second vice president. He replaced Robert Hislop. Sheena Alexander will now serve as general secretary. Lincoln Nelson also returned as treasurer unopposed. Hislop and Beckles, who have been long-serving members of the TCA, were named honorary members.
The 49-year-old John from Delaford said while four terms may sound like a long time, each term is made up of just two years which for him isn’t that long but he says he remains ‘very much energised and willing to work.’
As he embarks on this new term in office, special attention will be given to young cricketers on the island.
“Our main focus will be youth development. We have some youngsters that we have identified that we think will be the next set of Tobago top cricketers. We want to do something like a High Performance so that will be our main focus as well as we also want to keep the active players active. We need to get more senior players being established in national team trials. We need Tobago players performing and performing consistently,” said John, who played Premiership I cricket for Central Sports up until 2014.
With his position as president of the TCA, John is the second vice president of the TTCB and a member of the Cricket West Indies Board Cricket Committee.
While it has been a slow year for the sport given the COVID-19 pandemic, the island did host a successful Bago T10 Blast competition which welcomed the likes of Kieron Pollard, the Bravo brothers, Dwayne and Darren, and Sunil Narine in July.
John insists that cricket has a major part to play in helping to revitalise the tourism sector on the island that has suffered due to travel restrictions imposed to protect T&T from COVID-19. The TCA also has a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the St Vincent & the Grenadines Cricket Association which sees cricket teams from both islands touring each other year in, year out.