“The game is dead right now up here, nothing is happening for us because nobody wants to support the game at this end,” Kirk Fraser tells Stabroek Sport as he speaks openly about the dying state of basketball in the ancient county of Berbice.
Last week in an effort to spark a revival of the game in New Amsterdam, Fraser, the organising secretary of the Berbice Basketball Association (BBA), organised a game between Warriors Basketball Club and the Kashif and Shanghai Kings of Linden and the visitors won 46-42.
“People up there don’t really support the game, only like A. Ally and Sons would give us a trophy and so on, but other than that no one really looks at the game. They support cricket more than basketball and it’s a shame cause we have some pretty good players up here and we also produced some good players as well,” Fraser added.
He said that on December 27 they will be starting a tournament that will feature teams from Rose Hall Town, Litchfield, Smythfield and Fyrish.
“We hope that this tournament can bring us some support for the game in Berbice because like I said, it’s a mess right now. Right now we just have two teams in New Amsterdam, Warriors and Smythfield – Slingzer Royals, they are not really functioning so that is how things are running up here right now,” said Fraser.
Fraser who is known for actively trying to get the game up and running in the Berbice area said that they had personally approached all of the top businesses in the community to get support but still no one has so far stepped forward to help them out.
He said that recently a lot was promised by Director of Sport Neil Kumar when the National Sports Commission met with the Guyana Amateur Basketball Federation (GABF) and its affiliates (Georgetown Amateur Basketball Association (GABA) and the Linden Amateur Basketball Association (LABA) and the BBA).
At the meeting, Fraser said, Kumar promised some assistance but to date that aid is yet to be seen.
“When I was down in Georgetown for that meeting a while ago, I made it known of some areas in which we were in dire need of help, like right now we need some lights and seating for our court and Mr. Kumar said that they are some funds available to help us out and so on, but up to now we are still waiting,” the BBA organising secretary pointed out.
Fraser is of the opinion that everything is centralised with most of the emphasis in developing the game in Georgetown while the outer areas like Berbice are being stifled. “When we hear about basketball, we only hear about Georgetown and Linden but people forget about Berbice. We do have some really, really good players and when we have players leaving us we can’t really blame them because nothing is happening up here to keep them in Berbice,” Fraser noted.
He pointed to players like Hugh Arthur and recently, junior national point guard Richard Mohandatt who both play for Courts Pacesetter 1st and 3rd Division clubs respectively and are also both key players on the Pacesetter unit.
“I speak with Bobby (Cadogan) sometimes and he says that they too are getting nothing or finding it hard and I talk to Linden as well and they say the same, but for us in Berbice, the businesses they don’t support us. Myself and many others would put their own money into basketball sometimes cause we write plenty letters asking for sponsorship to GT&T and all of them, and yet still we get nothing, but we are still trying,” Fraser pointed out.
Meanwhile, the GABA will be hosting a Super-8 Inter-ward Basketball Tournament next week and Fraser told Stabroek Sport that they were invited to compete. He said he is hoping that they can be triumphant so that people can look at the game in the ancient county differently.
The team, he said, has players such as Carlos Crandon, former junior national point guard who many believed was stifled when playing in the city although he has a total package and there is also power forward Flint Hinds, among many other talented players.
The President of the BBA is Maxine Williams
