The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic may have far reaching effects on cricket regionally, however, Cricket West Indies Vice-President, Dr Kishore Shallow is of the belief that cricket may resume in the region no sooner than next year.
Shallow, who is just over 18 months into his term, revealed his observations during an interview on the Mason and Guest radio programme recently. When asked about local cricket, Shallow emphasized that it would be inaccurate to say that the region has not had any local cricket, categorizing the recently concluded Caribbean Premier League into that bracket. However, as it relates to the 50-over and First-Class seasons, fans will need to wait until 2021.
“So we are looking at early 2021 to have a [Super50] Regional tournament and that would be followed by our Four-Day tournament,” Shallow indicated.
According to the Vice-President, the prospect of West Indies hosting an international series next year is also on the cards. “I think it does not seem that we are going to have any international cricket in the region before the end of the year… What we are hoping for by early next year in the first quarter or by the second quarter to have some international cricket here in the West Indies.”
On the immediate front burner for Cricket West Indies is a tour to New Zealand later this year, said Shallow.
“There is a possibility of a tour later in November to New Zealand and I know the CEO and his team are working towards that, in the event that it is successful in terms of execution then most of our experienced players will be away so it might be better off to have that Super50 until the players return and that might be most likely be January,” Shallow said.
Shallow reckoned that this series was always in the pipelines even prior to the now postponed ICC T20 World Cup so it is a matter of fulfilling what was already planned.
