Gordon accepts tough cricket job

MEDIA magnate Ken Gordon says he is “grateful and honoured” to be picked for presidency of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB). Gordon, the WICB president designate, embraced his new post but said he preferred to wait until the position is confirmed at the August 7 WICB Annual General Meeting in St Maarten before making any comment on West Indies cricket. Nominated by the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board to the post left vacant by outgoing president Teddy Griffith, Trinidadian Gordon, a Caribbean Broadcasting Hall of Fame inductee, was the sole nominee for the top position when nominations for the WICB presidency closed Thursday evening.

The election of a president and vice-president will be the main items on the agenda at next month’s AGM. The Leeward Islands Cricket Association (LICA) seconded Gordon’s nomination, while the Windward Islands Cricket Association (WICA) and the Jamaica Cricket Association (JCA) also offered support for his nomination. Gordon was inducted into the Caribbean Broadcasting Union’s Caribbean Broadcasting Hall of Fame in August 2000. The 60-year-old former West Indies captain and team manager Clive Lloyd, from Guyana, and Anguilla’s Val Banks have been put forward as the names to contest the position of vice president at the WICB’s AGM. Lloyd, who captained the West Indies successfully during the 1970s and ’80s, had stated his interest in becoming president of the WICB after Griffith indicated that he would not accept nomination for a second term of office, but he failed to gain support for his bid, as did several others also seeking a nomination for the post of president.

A release from the WICB on Saturday confirmed that Gordon had been the only nomination received for the post of president. Retired Barbadian banker Tony Marshall had also been put forward by Barbados and Jamaica had ex-WICB president Pat Rousseau as their first choice but Marshall and Rousseau subsequently withdrew their interest in the position. The Board is also expected to discuss the financial statements and report of the directors and auditors for the year ended September 30. The WICB directors will hold their third regular meeting for 2005 on the day prior to the AGM. (CMC)