By Delvon Mc Ewan
National Under-19 cricketer Balchand Baldeo is happy.
Baldeo, a rookie at the U19 level, was a member of the victorious Guyana U19 team which won the Regional U19 One-Day and Three-Day tournaments held recently in Guyana.
“It was a delightful moment in my career to be a part of such a team in my first year as a member of a national youth team,” said Baldeo in a telephone interview with this publication.
Though he did not cash in on his obvious potential with the bat, the youngster (who was selected mainly for his batting ability) contributed heavily with the ball in the limited overs format of the competition.
Baldeo captured 11 wickets in the one-day version of the competition to finish third behind leading spinners Steven Sankar and Sharaz Ramcharan.
He also picked up seven (7) wickets in the three-day competition.
With four centuries to date, including a double century (made against High Reef Twilight U-19 team) at age 17,
much was expected of Baldeo, especially after he had scored a brilliant century (177) against Essequibo in the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) U-19 Inter-County tournament, which was used to select the Guyana U-19 team.
However, the former Lower Corentyne Secondary School student finished with 39 runs from five innings or three matches in the longer version while totaling 15 from three innings in the one-day competition.
Baldeo said his performance was satisfactory but he would have been pleased if he had contributed more with the bat. According to him, his failure with the bat was due to the presence of nerves each time he entered the crease and to a lesser extent some flaws in his batting later identified by the coaches.
When asked if batting at the unusual number four position added to his poor performances with the bat, Baldeo, who opens the batting for his club Albion, disagreed.
He said at the commencement of the tournament he knew there were three experienced opening batsmen in Tagenarine `Young Tiger’ Chanderpaul, Shimron Hetmyer and Brian Sattaur and therefore realized he had to bat in the middle.
Baldeo is currently preparing for the GCB senior Inter-County tournament. It will be the first time the Guyana U-19 team is included in the tournament, replacing the President’s XI.
According to Baldeo, his preparation is being conducted during the daily Albion’s nets sessions. He said he is trying to make this opportunity count so his cricket could progress to a higher level.
Baldeo joins Hetmyer, Kemo Paul and Renaldo Ali-Mohamed as one of four players that featured in this year’s championship team with a year remaining at the U-19 level. An opportunity he said he is more than happy to have because he want to be more dominant with the bat and will be training overtime to achieve his goal.
