By Neto Baptiste
President of the Antigua and Barbuda Cricket Association (ABCA), Leon Rodney, has condemned the actions of vandals who, last weekend, removed the covers securing the pitch at the Jennings playing field and spread broken bottles and other debris on the surface.
The action forced the association to move the match scheduled for March 2-3 between the home team Jennings Tigers and neighbours Bolans Blasters to All Saints as the pitch was also left soaked by overnight rainfall.
“Somebody must be held accountable. You’re telling me that youths can be identified and the police can’t arrest the youths, question them, and then probably bring in the parents or the parents have to walk them in. What I think is going to happen is those youth will back people into a wall and somebody is going to get hurt and then somebody is going to say ‘you are taking advantage of the youths’.
“It should be taken as a criminal offence because they covered down the pitch and you come in the morning inly to find that you can’t play your home game after all that hard work. It’s pathetic,” he said.
President of the Jennings Cricket Club Glen Miller also condemned the action, adding that the alleged perpetrators of the act are well-known and that the matter was reported to law enforcers. He said the club was however informed that the police’s hands are tied as no one actually saw those accused committing the act.
The obviously irate president said he does not know where else to turn.
“When you say anything, the parents curse you, so you don’t want to get yourself in anything because you have your family too and you don’t want to get into no physical altercation with anybody. It’s not easy for you to work on a pitch day after day … we got new covers from the association and I don’t even know is the cover is torn right now,” he said.
Miller revealed that vandalism at the facility has been an issue for some time now.
“And even as the building [pavilion] was built over there, you have people who vandalise the building, broke out windows, defecate in the building and stuff like that. They even caught fire to a part so I want to make it clear — because I don’t want people to get the wrong notion that the football and the cricket have a problem — because we work together; we do not have a problem,” he said.
Jennings eventually won the clash by an innings and 56 runs after bowling out the opponents for 57 and 60 while making 177 for four declared. They sit second on the standings with 70 points.