King City green-top test for Canada's elites
15 May 2005
OCA Press release
The King City cricket facility, owned by the clubs of the Toronto and District Cricket Association, has the only turf pitch ready at this time of the year, says new manager Austin Ward.
That's why this weekend's three-day Victoria Day Cricket Festival (May 21-23) has had to be switched to King City, 45 minutes north of Toronto, from Sunnybrook Park which has not weathered the winter well.
"The one turf pitch available is well grassed and reasonably firm," says Ward but he expressed doubts as to whether the one strip would last under the pounding of three 60 overs matches. "We'll just have to wait and see," he said.
The intensely competitive matches pit the CCA President's X1 against the OCA President's X! for modest Winner-Take-All and Man-of-the-Match cash prizes. The national selectors will also get their last look at the candidates from all across Canada vying for the 14 spots on the team to the ICC Trophy in Ireland in July. The top five teams in Ireland go on to the 2007 World Cup in the West Indies.
Man-of-the-Match Adjudicators are former West Indian fast bowlers Grayson Shillingford (Sat May 21), Tom Dewdney (Sun May 22) and Anderson Cummins (Mon May 23). Match Referees are former Canadian players Robin Ramsammy, Danny Singh and Davis Joseph. Matches start at 10. a.m.
Meanwhile, reports out of Quebec are that fast bowler Ashish Patel may be a doubtful starter after injuring himself. He is the fourth player from the team that lost to Scotland in the Intercontinental Cup final late last year on the injury list. Two others, batsman Zubin Surkari and allrounder Sunil Dhaniram, are required to play all three of the Festival games to demonstrate fitness, while Austin Codrington has been withdrawn from the squad because of a back injury. Wicketkeeper/batsman Ashish Bagai has also withdrawn because of work commitments.
THE SQUADS
CCA PRESIDENT'S X1: Pubudu Dassanayake, John Davison (captains), Iain Dixon, Chana Kularantna, Sajeeve Fernando, Haninder Dhillon, Kevin Sandher (B.C.), Suresh Jayaram (Manitoba), Ashish Patel (Quebec), Zubin Surkari, Umar Bhatti, Jason Patraj, Andrew Chatterpaul, Sanjay Thuraisingham, Anderson Cummins (guest player) (Ontario). Mike Henry (manager), Rupert Gomes (head coach), Colin Siller (specialist coach), Derek Perera (analyst).
OCA PRESIDENT'S X1: George Codrington, Ishwar Maraj (captains), Manzoor Chaudhary, Salmon Chaudhary, Jacob Ramkelwan,Sumit Thapliyal, Amjad Shehzad (Alberta), Desmond Chumney, Nicholas Ifill, Asif Mulla,Sunil Dhaniram,Arjune Nandu,Zahid Hussain, Henry Osinde, Don Maxwell (Ontario). Errol Townshend (manager/head coach), Kris Sawh (asst. manager), George Heron (asst.coach/trainer), Lennox Cooper (analyst).