Competitions Chairman of the Georgetown Cricket Association (GCA), Shaun Massiah says that almost all the clubs under the association have responded well to the call to be vaccinated but with the latest suspension of cricket activities, is recommending a meeting for the Task Force to discuss the way forward.
Massiah made this disclosure during an exclusive interview with this publication yesterday.
According to the Transport Sports Club first division all-rounder, “We were looking to resume in September whereby we sought permission from the National Task Force and they requested us to ensure all players were vaccinated before we restarted.”
He added, “We subsequently had a meeting from all the representatives and put the guidelines to them. They went back to their clubs and spoke with the players. After that, they submitted a report to me with 12 of the 16 clubs in Georgetown saying their players are vaccinated, approximately 80 percent of each club’s players and from then to now I would feel it would reach really close to 100 percent by now.”
Massiah said that the association had streamlined its tournaments to roll out with a youth competition that would feature players who had received their first dose Pfizer vaccine and awaiting their second dose. This competition was scheduled to bowl off around October 9.
The Competitions Chairman reiterated that with the series of stop and start of cricket since the COVID-19 pandemic came to local shores, a number of tournaments dating back to 2019 are still to be played.
“This suspension has hampered a lot of the youths’ performances. We have a lot of cricket to play. We have tournaments running from since 2019; we have sponsors on hold; we have cricket on hold right now just waiting on the resumption,” he said.
Recently a Guyana Cricket Board press release informed that the Task Force had halted all cricket.
“We recently learnt that the Task Force has suspended cricket but there is some confusion pertaining to that as far as I am concerned because we see other sports are playing while cricket is suffering,” said Massiah.
“Maybe the heads could meet with the Task Force to see what more is required to have cricket back because when you look around we know the cases are going up. We are concerned. We are not forcing anyone to play but we were asked to take the vaccine, we complied and now we got to wait.”
