Wright points to sponsorship

Jermaine Lannaman, Gleaner Writer

Newly elected president of the Jamaica Cricket Association (JCA), Lyndel 'Muddy' Wright, says the garnering of sponsorships to help support the association's plans and programmes will be one of his administration's main priorities throughout its two-year reign.

According to Wright, who defeated businessman Paul Campbell 55-35 in the race for the post on Wednesday at the association's biannual general meeting, no association that is largely volunteer, as the JCA is, can be run effectively without the financial support of both the private and public sectors.

This, he says, has been the case with the JCA in recent years, and with his new team and other cricket-loving professionals, he hopes to change this reality.

sponsorships

"One of the areas that we plan to focus on is the generation of sponsorships so that we can carry out our plans and programmes to properly develop our players for Twenty20, 50-overs, and two-day and four-day formats of the game," he said.

"This should then improve the quality of play, and help to make the sport popular again," he added.

The JCA, which has struggled to gain sponsorship under the tenure of Campbell, had to rationalise its competitions this season due to a lack of finances, with its much-promoted two-day semi-professional Super League having to be scrapped.

It has been replaced by the traditional Senior Cup, which has been expanded to include all clubs and parishes, and will be played over a two-month period.

It is also unclear as to what are the association's plans regarding 50-overs and Twenty20 cricket competitions, the latter of which was not played last season, and affected Jamaica's performance in the cash-rich Caribbean Twenty20 tournament.

The other members of Wright's seven-member executive, who were elected unopposed after it was announced that he had won, include Milton Henry (first vice-president), Dr David Bennett (second vice-president), Fritz Harris (secretary), Ian Brown (assistant secretary), Nigel Logan (treasurer) and Maurice Clarke (assistant treasurer).