“It was the coming together of two champions,” according to Public Relations Officer of the Berbice Cricket Board(BCB) Hilbert Foster yesterday at the canteen of the Guyana Telephone & Telegraph (GT&T) company yesterday.
Foster was speaking on the occasion of the launching of the one-year sponsorship deal of the BCB’s Under-15, Under-17, Under-19 Female A-Team and the Men’s Senior Inter-County team from October 2010-December 2011 in a package deal worth $1 million.
The sponsorship will be divided in two parts with the first part going towards equipping clubs in Berbice with $300,000 worth of balls while the other $200,000 will go towards the development of the senior Inter-County male team.
Under the sponsorship deal Foster said that the teams will be renamed under the Cellink brand, adding that the BCB and GT&T have agreed on several areas that would reflect the sponsorship.
“A banner outlining the sponsorship would be displayed at all venues that the team plays; three of the BCB annual awards would be renamed after Cellink; the players would be outfitted with T-Shirts for practice along with caps with the Cellink logos while in tournament the team would be provided with Cellink shirts; Cellink would review widespread media coverage whenever any of the Berbice team plays,” Foster said.
In the proposal Cellink would have the right to use any of the official team images in their promotions while individual advertisement deals would have to be made with the players themselves.
During his opening speech Foster also stated that over the last three years cricket has undergone a remarkable revolution and the passion, commitment and discipline that was missing has returned through the efforts of the BCB.
“Today, Berbice is at an all-time high due to sheer hard work, commitment, visionary and forward planning and leadership,” said the PRO, who is also the CEO of the Rose Hall Town youth & Sports Club.
“We at the Berbice Cricket Board are very pleased at obtaining this sponsorship and to be associated with our friends at GT&T Cellink. “As a known fact Berbice is dominating cricket in Guyana and this merger is nothing more than the coming together of two champions.
“At the beginning of 2009, the board made it known that we intended to dominate at all levels and we have fulfilled that promise”, Foster declared.
Marketing Manager of GT&T Wystan Robertson said that while the company will be getting commercial value, the company’s contribution will always be to the service of the community. He stated that the company is pleased to offer a service to the community and when the BCB’s proposal was placed on his desk it was a holistic document that served the community.
During Robertson’s brief speech he also applauded the efforts of the Guyanese trio on the West Indies team, which recently won the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) Women’s Challenge Cup in South Africa.
President of the BCB Keith Foster thanked GT&T for its “innovation” and promised the company that the Board will continue to develop the talents of the youth cricketers.
Well wishers at the event also praised the Board for the effort to secure such a sponsorship deal. The well wishers were presidents of the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) and Georgetown Cricket Association (GCA) Chetram Singh and Roger Harper respectively.
Also offering their congratulations were president of the Demerara Cricket Club (DCB) Bissondial Singh, former president of GCA and General Secretary of the GCB Bishwa Panday and current PRO of GCB and Deputy General Manager of GT&T Terry Holder.
