Cricket boss defends finals venue practice

President of the Antigua and Barbuda Cricket Association (ABCA), Leon Rodney, has sought to clear the air following accusations he is deliberately trying to snub the PIC Liberta Blackhawks through “biased” scheduling of matches and in particular, league finals.
Rodney was responding to one caller on the Good Morning Jojo Sports Show and a member of the Liberta Sports Club, Denmore Roberts, who accused him of wanting to “punish” the club because its President, Kenneth Benjamin, had resigned as coach of the Antigua cricket team ahead of last year’s Tri-Nation tournament.
“We’ve had final played at Liberta between other teams so for us to get into that and they tried to do that already last year by saying that I didn’t want to make down there [Liberta] a practice venue [for a Cricket West Indies tournament] and Roland Holder had to call and clear the issue. If Liberta is the third best venue apart from the national stadium [Sir Vivian Richards Cricket Ground] and maybe the recreation grounds [Antigua Recreation Grounds] everybody know Liberta is the next best ground so I am just begging Denmore to just stop the foolishness right boss,” he said.
Blackhawks will face Empire Nation in the finals of the ABCA Two Day cricket competition on Saturday and Sunday. The match will however be played at a neutral venue as, according to Rodney, has been the practice over the last three to four years.
One venue that has been considered is the Coolidge Cricket Ground which, as it stands, is not available for the finals. A decision, Rodney said, will be made in short order.
“We have tried to get the airport ground [Coolidge Cricket Ground] and they are preparing, not only for the female world cup, but Bangladesh has a match there in a few days, so what will happen is that, usually, we operate in the modern technological era where sometimes we round-robin via WhatsApp and fortunately, Tuesday night [last night] is one of our meeting nights so that decision of exactly where the game will be played, you will get that first thing in the morning [Wednesday],” the president said. 
Blackhawks picked up first innings points against CUB Bethesda Golden Eagles while Empire advanced via a similar result over Burton’s Laundry All Saints Pythons in the semifinals.