By Anthony Foster, Freelance Writer
Prime Minister P.J. Patterson, centre, president of Jamaica Cricket Association (JCA) Jackie Hendriks, left, and Dr. Wayne Reid, chairman, Jamaica's Bidding Committee, laugh after viewing the drawing for the Sabina Park and Greenfield sites vying to host matches for West Indies World Cup 2007. - Junior Dowie/Staff Photographer
PRIME MINISTER P.J. Patterson and Jamaica Cricket Association's (JCA) president Jackie Hendriks signed off on Jamaica's bid documents to host matches in the Cricket World Cup (CWC) 2007 at Jamaica House yesterday.
Earlier, on April 23, the Prime Minister announced that Sabina Park and a yet to be constructed Greenfield Stadium in Trelawny would submit bids to host matches in world one-day cricket's showpiece event.
At yesterday's signing, which took place at the Prime Minister's Conference Room, Patterson, a former CARICOM chairman, said a release on what would be done at Sabina Park and Greenfield Stadium could be expected soon.
After the signing, the documents, which have to be in Barbados by Thursday, were handed over to Dr. Wayne Reid, chairman of Jamaica's bidding committee.
"At the moment we will have to await the award of the bid proposals and then it is only after September that we will get instruction or clearance from the WICB (West Indies Cricket Board) and CWC 2007 as to how we will proceed," Patterson said.
TWO VENUES
In the meantime, Patterson said what they want to do is to have the bid proposals or the tenders well in advance and, as he explained last month, the tenders will be in the alternatives - Greenfield for preliminary and warm-up matches and Sabina Park for quarter-finals and the final. It that doesn't work, it would be the other way around.
However, according to the Prime Minister, as to "what capacity we need to put in at Sabina Park or what capacity we need to put in at Greenfield, we won't know until September".
The four-month wait is because the venue assessment team (VAT) will look at the bids and venues before making its recommendation to the Cricket World Cup 2007 committee, headed by Jamaican banker Chris Dehring, which will then decide on the venues with the approval of the ICC.
MAIN THREATS
Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago are the two venues cited by Reid as the main threats to Jamaica's bidding proposals. Although seeing them as threats, Reid said: "I think we have put forward two very good bids. We have an extremely good chance of getting at least one. There is no problem about that."
"In the way we put forward our bids, we should stand a very good chance of getting two (packages)," he said while admitting that Jamaica's record of hosting the World Junior Athletics Championships and the World Netball Championships should also boost the country's chances.
His argument is based on Jamaica's infrastructure. "We have the facilities, we have more importantly the infrastructure to back our bids, that is the experience of running large events such as this, the health support, the security support, the ground transportation, accommodation, we have 60 per cent of all the hotel rooms in the English-speaking Caribbean."
No work has started at either site and, in the case of a new stadium, the pitch will have to be put in and set for use, at least a year, before it can be given ICC clearance, but the Prime Minister was confident Jamaica would be ready.
"We are going to proceed to clear the (Greenfield) site completely and the first order of business is the laying down of the wicket," said Patterson.
"You can't really do anything about the expansion until you know what you have been awarded and until you get final clearance from CWC 2007, because they may make slight modifications or serious modifications to the proposal that have been put in by way of bid packages.
"We are getting everything in place to be ready so that when they say go in September, we are in a position to dispatch," he said.
