Rain forces cancellation of Singlewicket Tournament

Speaking to Newsday yesterday, event organiser Andre Phillips said it was disappointing for the committee and the players.

He said the Cyd Gray Complex in Roxborough was unplayable as rain fell unabated for two days.

“It was hugely difficult and depressing, people from all over the island set their hearts on coming to enjoy this year’s Singlewicket competition, and we tried our best but we could not fight against the bad weather that continued to deteriorate so we called off the tournament before 6 pm and we had to start dismantling our things,” said Phillips. “That was our position. It is cricket and rain interferes with cricket and we were just unlucky for the first time in five consecutive years,” he continued.

Phillips said calling off the tournament was in the interest of the players’ safety.

“When we arrived to do our preliminary (inspection) the groundsmen discovered that the field was okay but there was seepage on the pitch from the heavy downfall. The groundsmen needed an extra half an hour to work on it and we were hoping to begin at 5 pm.

“Then another shower of rain came down very sharp but short and that set us back and we decided by six o’ clock the tournament could not be played in a complete way to justify the process.

We recognised the weather conditions were not improving so we called off the tournament.” Phillips said talks are underway to host the tournament at another time.

“We had dialogue with the all-rounders, both from Trinidad and Tobago, to see the possibility of their commitment to try to have the tournament again and to be played before the end of this year. We have to consider if we can host the tournament on the Cyd Gray Stadium because it is heavily used for football in June.

“We would look for a window to bring it back to Tobago if not on the Shaw Park Complex grounds sometime in the middle of September. It was a situation to see where we could accommodate everyone and the final decision was in September,” Phillips ended.