T&T aim for hat-trick

Jermaine Lannaman, Gleaner Writer

Four of the eight teams that will be participating in this year's West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) President's Cup one-day tournament, which will be held here from October 14-24, arrived in the country yesterday high on confidence and full of expectations.

Led by back-to-back winners, Trinidad and Tobago, the quartet also included the Windward Islands, the Leeward Islands and the Combined Campuses and Colleges (CCC).

The Trinidadians, who will be gunning for a historic third straight hold on the title, were led by captain Darren Ganga and had in their entourage Dwayne Bravo, his younger brother Darren Bravo, Kieron Pollard and Adrian Barath.

"As defending back-to-back champions we come into the tournament with a lot of confidence," said Ganga.

Hope to get it right

"We did not do too well in the Caribbean Twenty20 and only made it to the semi-finals and the hope is that this time around we can get it right."

The Trinis, who will face Jamaica at Sabina Park on Saturday in the feature game of the first round, will open their account tomorrow at Kensington Park against the CCC.

The match will be one of two Group A matches on the day with Jamaica, led by Chris Gayle, Brendan Nash and Nikita Miller tackling the Windward Islands at the Trelawny Multi-purpose Stadium.

Both matches begin at 9 a.m.

"Our aim is to be in the top two and make it to the semis," said Windward Islands captain, Darren Sammy, who is being touted as a possible replacement for the Windies captaincy, should the WICB decide to take the skipper's role from Gayle, after he recently refused to sign a central retainer contract with the sport's regional governors.

"The first game will be a big hurdle against Jamaica, but it's cricket and who plays better on the day will win.

"We had a mini-camp in Antigua where we had a few practice games against the Leeward Islands and the guys looked good, especially the bowlers," Sammy added.

The Windwards will look to batsmen Devon Smith, Andre Fletcher and spinner Shane Shillingford for inspiration, as they seek to lay claim to the crown for the first time since 2000-01.

Meanwhile, Leewards manager, Lockhart Sebastian, says his team is quite capable of making a run at the title and they will be aiming to surprise.

"We have a fairly balanced squad and will be giving it our best shot," said Sebastian.

The Leewards will be banking their hopes on captain Wilden Cornwall, fast bowlers Lionel Baker and Gavin Tonge and spinner Omari Banks.

The CCC, who reached the semi-finals of the tournament last year, will in the meanwhile look to captain Romel Currency, Omar Phillips, wicketkeeper Chadwick Walton and player/coach Floyd Reifer.

The other competitors - Barbados, Guyana and the developmental WICB/Sagicor High Performance Centre team - are slated to arrive today.

Group B will bowl off on Friday with Barbados going up against the Leeward Islands at Sabina Park and the WICB/Sagicor High Performance Centre taking on Guyana at Kensington Park.