By Treiston Joseph
National cricket coach Mark Harper said yesterday he was disappointed with the lack of preparations for Guyana’s match against the touring Pakistan cricketers this weekend.
Last week the Guyana national selectors named 13 players from which the final 11 to oppose Pakistan will be chosen and yesterday Harper said he was a bit upset that a request for preparations for the squad was turned down.
“Well I made a request for the team to start preparing for the game but it was denied,” he told Stabroek Sport.
The former Guyana middle order batsman added:“But we can’t continue to take team preparations casually and lightly and we are not getting that and I was very disappointed.”
On the plus side Harper revealed that both West Indies stars Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Ramnaresh Sarwan have been included in the team to oppose Pakistan and expressed the view that “ it will be good to have their experience in the side.”
Asked by Stabroek Sport who denied his request to start the team’s preparation, Harper simply replied “the request was made to the Guyana Cricket Board and I’ll leave it at that.”
Cricket Development Officer (CDC) of the Guyana Cricket Board Reon King said yesterday that the board had discussed the issue and had taken a decision that the team would commence preparations on May 6 two days prior to the start of the match.
King, a former West Indies speedster, said Harper was made aware of the fact that he had been named coach of the team on Friday last and had expressed his concern over having only two days to work with the squad.
King also said that while a manager has been named, who is Carl Moore, the selectors have not yet named a captain.
Efforts to contact Chairman of the national selectors Claude Raphael yesterday proved futile and Stabroek Sport learnt that he was out of the country.
Harper expressed a bit of skepticism of the team’s chances against the visitors.
“All I could say is that the team will be going out there to put their best foot forward and be competitive,” he commented.
The Pakistan and West Indies teams are expected to arrive at 2.30pm today. Both teams will be staying at the Le Meridien Pegasus Hotel and are expected to commence net sessions tomorrow.
The Guyana team named reads: Shemroy Barrington, Trevon Griffith, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Assad Fudadin, Narsingh Deonarine, Derwin Christian, Amir Khan, Ronsford Beaton, Keon Joseph, Zaheer Mohammed, Gajanand Singh and Leon Johnson.
There are five stand by players named and they are Anthony Bramble, Andre Stoll, Paul Wintz, Richard Ramdeen and Steven Jacobs.
