The T&T Un­der-19 team se­lect­ed to par­tic­i­pate in the up­com­ing Crick­et West In­dies (CWI) Ris­ing Stars Re­gion­al Tour­na­ment has been de­scribed as the “best ever” and was chal­lenged to re­turn home vic­to­ri­ous.

This was con­veyed by Az­im Bas­sarath, pres­i­dent of the T&T Crick­et Board (TTCB), and vice-pres­i­dent of the re­gion­al crick­et body, CWI.

He was speak­ing on Mon­day when the play­ers, ac­com­pa­nied by their par­ents/guardians, and rep­re­sen­ta­tives of team spon­sors, as­sem­bled at the Na­tion­al Crick­et Cen­tre in Bal­main, Cou­va to col­lect their play­ing kits which will be used in St Vin­cent and the Grenadines, the venue for the month-long tour­na­ment.

Present al­so was the man­ag­er of the Un­der-19 team Ker­win John, the sec­ond vice-pres­i­dent of the TTCB, and pres­i­dent of the To­ba­go Crick­et As­so­ci­a­tion; and Bhood­esh Dook­ie, the na­tion­al team coach.

“This U-19 team is the best team ever se­lect­ed to rep­re­sent T&T in this age group,” Bas­sarath said out­lin­ing the clin­i­cal prepa­ra­tions they have un­der­gone to date.

He said the out­stand­ing line-up start­ed the sea­son play­ing in the Pt Lisas Steel Prod­ucts Lim­it­ed U-19 In­ter Zone Tour­na­ment, then went on to the Sports and Cul­ture Fund Four-Team U-19 Cup, cul­mi­nat­ing in the Price Club North-South Clas­sic.

Sig­nif­i­cant­ly, an U-19 team in which sev­er­al of the present play­ers were in­clud­ed par­tic­i­pat­ed in the Pre­mier­ship II (South Zone) com­pe­ti­tion gain­ing valu­able ex­pe­ri­ence among se­niors in two-day red ball crick­et and 50-Overs com­pe­ti­tion.

The U-19s al­so qual­i­fied for the Pre­mier­ship II Fi­nal in the TTCB/Paria Fu­el T20 Fes­ti­val and won the run­ners-up cheque for $20,000.

Bas­sarath said the prepa­ra­tion would have con­tin­ued un­der coach Dook­ie with train­ing ses­sions and tri­al match­es to en­sure they were all fit and ready for the over­seas as­sign­ment against their re­gion­al coun­ter­parts.

“You have a lot rest­ing on your shoul­ders. Most of you would have played in the 2022 Re­gion­al West In­dies Tour­na­ment, and the TTCB and the pub­lic ex­pect noth­ing less than you bring­ing back the two tro­phies at stake in the tour­na­ment.

“You have the abil­i­ty and you all can match any oth­er West In­di­an play­er at this age any­where in the Caribbean. So you will have no rea­son not to bring back those two tro­phies, and we will not ac­cept any­thing less,” Bas­sarath said.

The lo­cal and re­gion­al crick­et boss ac­knowl­edged that it is a lot of pres­sure to car­ry the weight of ex­pec­ta­tion but the play­ers must be aware of the con­tri­bu­tion be­ing made ef­fort, time, en­er­gy, and re­sources by the TTCB, since last year.

He urged the U-19s to trav­el as a team and main­tain the same spir­it since on­ly 11 play­ers will be se­lect­ed to play in any match­es, leav­ing three on the bench.

Bas­sarath said the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of team se­lec­tion lies with the man­ag­er, coach, and the team cap­tain, and he warned against out­side in­ter­fer­ence which could dis­tract from the fo­cus and uni­ty in the squad.

He said pref­er­en­tial treat­ment of any play­er will not be tol­er­at­ed and should be brought to his at­ten­tion since as TTCB pres­i­dent, he has the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to en­sure every child re­ceives equal treat­ment.

Bas­sarath ex­pressed his ap­pre­ci­a­tion on be­half of the TTCB to all the gen­er­ous donors who pro­vid­ed the equip­ment bags, back­packs, hel­mets, and ac­ces­sories for the en­tire squad.

Those who fa­cil­i­tat­ed the do­na­tion were 360 Crick­et, the pre­mier live-stream­ing out­fit (Equip­ment bags); Tribe Car­ni­val Pro­duc­tions (Hel­mets and Back­packs), Seenath’s Au­to Sup­plies (Sweaters), and Val­ue Op­ti­cal (Hats).

“The TTCB would not have been able to pro­vide every­thing for the young men. We are ap­pre­cia­tive of the ef­forts the par­ents and com­pa­nies have al­so made to pro­vide the equip­ment the boys need,” Bas­sarath said.

T&T Un­der-19 Squad: Joshua Davis (cap­tain), Justin Jages­sar (vice-cap­tain). Kyle Ram­doo, Kyle Kissoon­dath, Ra­jeev Ram­nath, Nick Ram­lal, Fa­reez Ali, Vas­ant Singh, Olan­do James, Ja­cen Agard, Liam Mam­chan, Ronillester Per­reira, Ab­dur- Rah­man Ju­man, An­drew Ram­baran. Ker­win John (man­ag­er), Bhood­esh Dook­ie (coach).