(Trinidad Express) Compared with other Caribbean partners, particularly Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago has got a raw deal in terms of World Cup Cricket matches to be played on local soil.
They will not draw crowds nor generate income for local businesses and citizens.
This was the position advanced by United National Congress (UNC) Senator Anil Roberts as he contributed to the debate on the ICC Men’s T20 Cricket World Cup 2024 Bill in the Senate, at the Red House, Port of Spain, yesterday.
While Roberts agreed with the Attorney General that there would be two billion people watching this event, he said: “But they will certainly not be watching Afghanistan play Papua New Guinea in the Brian Lara Stadium.
“That is what we have. We have four matches, only one of those matches, other than the semi-finals, will cause traffic—the West Indies versus New Zealand. We have Papua New Guinea and then New Zealand versus Uganda.
“With all due respect to these wonderful sovereign countries, they are not cricketing powerhouses that are going to set the world on fire, causing people across the globe to turn on their TVs to see the brilliance…and skill of Papua New Guinea.
“We don’t know what is the benefit, the cost, because I see the Brian Lara Stadium, which is the most costly stadium on the planet at a whopping US$135,000 per seat, $1.3 billion, I see works going on there to renovate and refurbish a brand new, expensive, just-opened stadium where surrounding it you only have ‘sapate’ mud and razor grass. But we are saying that we want to use this World Cup to generate revenue,” Roberts said.
“The main benefit of sport tourism and hosting an event is two billion people watching it. But already, we missed the boat because Barbados has eight matches, including the final and some of their group matches; they have three Super 8 matches while we have no Super 8.
“They (Barbados) have matches including England and big teams that people will watch…Antigua has four Super 8 matches. Even the USA, who is now venturing into cricket, got matches including Pakistan and India.
“When you have the Indian team playing, you already have 1.2 billion people watching, and if we had 1.2 billion people watching, we could show them T&T, Maracas Beach, bake and shark, doubles, tassa, Pigeon Point, Englishman’s Bay,” he said.
Robert asked the Government to explain the choice to move away from the Oval, a place of history and legacy, located in the middle of the busiest commercial area, with restaurants, food and entertainment where visitors can spend money and where there would be a multiplier effect, allowing business owners and citizens to make money, to instead hold the cricket matches where it only have mud, no business and no food.
Roberts said while Barbados has been advertising “non-stop” on the IPL (Indian Premier League), he had not seen one T&T ad.
“I ain’t see a pan, a moko jumbie, I ain’t see anything yet about Trinidad and Tobago World Cup that we marketing to earn money. It is the best-kept secret,” he said, adding that Trinidad and Tobago’s culture was far more appealing than Barbados’ to participating countries like India, Sri Lanka and Malaysia.
Roberts said “through the decimation of Trinidad and Tobago cricket by this unfortunate Government”, this country had the lowest number of Trinbagonians on the West Indies cricket team.
AG: Thousands expected
Piloting the bill, Attorney General Reginald Armour urged senators “for the love of cricket, lovely cricket on both sides”, to give this bill “the easy passage that it deserves”.
Noting the T20 World Cricket Cup event is being hosted in the US and six countries—Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Guyana, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago—he said this country had been working closely with the co-ordinating Caricom host countries to harmonise primary and subsidiary legislation for this T20 World Cup event. The sunset legislation automatically expires on June 30, 2024, he said.
The Attorney General said it was anticipated the event would be viewed by approximately two billion people virtually.
“We also anticipate thousands of spectators to our shores to be physically present to view the matches scheduled to be played here as well as in other host Caricom countries,” he said.
He said in anticipation of the influx of people to these shores and for the ease of travel during the specified period, the Minister of National Security had already signed sunset Immigration regulations that would expire after the T20 World Cup event.
Saying the mutual recognition of visas in 2024 had been published as Legal Notice No 69 of 2024 and was laid in both Houses of Parliament, the Attorney General said notwithstanding the mutual recognition of visas, Trinidad and Tobago will retain its sovereign right to refuse entry to persons seeking to enter Trinidad and Tobago.
The Attorney General said matches will be held from June 12, 2024, at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy, and the semi-final match will be held on June 26 at the same venue.
He said warm-up matches will be held at the Queen’s Park Oval while practice sessions will be held at the Queen’s Park Oval, Sir Frank Warren Memorial Ground at The UWI, and the Diego Martin Sporting Complex.