By Neto Baptiste
A two-week window spanning April 25 to May 7 has been identified as the timeline set to host the Cool & Smooth T20 Explosion.
This is according to head of the tournament’s organising team, Dario Barthley, who said the majority of the country’s top tier teams will compete for the EC$20,000 grand prize.
“We will have eight of the ABCA clubs participating within the tournament and as usual we are looking forward to a fair cricketing competition. Also, from our perspective, we will add in the entertainment aspect and hopefully, this year we can bring back the tournament really strong. We have been on a hiatus since Covid-19 where the pandemic put a stop to a lot of things including Cool & Smooth T20, but we are back and we are excited to be back, we are excited to be partners with the ABCA in terms of developing this format of cricket within the country,” he said.
The tournament will be making its anticipated return following a two-year hiatus owing to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Hinting that there could be changes to this year’s format, Barthley said the organising team is still in the planning stages and would welcome meaning feedback from stakeholders.
“Obviously it’s good; there are things that we do that are good, but everything can be better and that’s not just from the perspective of on the field in terms of play, but in terms of preparation, in terms of professionalism. I encourage anyone who has innovative ideas about the tournament to reach out to me. I think that we have a solid team on the ground, ready and willing to work to put things in place,” he said.
The Cricket West Indies (CWI) media officer revealed also that the players draft, which allows teams to select from a pool of regional and international players, will also feature ahead of this year’s tournament.
“Based on conversations with the ABCA, what we are looking at is a draft system. However, how exactly that system will work is still in formulation. What we spoke about is reverse order drafting [team finishing last in previous tournament gets first pick in the draft] based on finishes in the last Cool & Smooth T20 tournament and that type of structure which we would have employed in the past. There will be some type of drafting system, however, the details of that we will try to reveal during this week,” Barthley said.
PIC Liberta Blackhawks won the 2019 edition of the tournament.