Garner elected Barbados president

Joel Garner, the former West Indies fast bowler, has been appointed the Barbados Cricket Association's tenth president, comfortably beating Calvin Hope by 40 votes, and has vowed to implement a five-year plan to put Bajan cricket back on the map.

"I'm honoured to be elected to lead Barbados' cricket forward," Garner told The Nation. "I'm going to try to put cricket back in the main focus of the BCA and at the end of the year, try to have people thinking the way they should in terms of cricket.

"I think it [the election] came down to people trusting and believing that I'm the best person to lead Barbados cricket at this time. We have to sit down and have a meeting to look at the way forward. We've got a five-year development plan that we've started working with. We'll proceed with it, but look at all aspects of cricket."

Conde Riley, who has been on the association's board for several years, was chosen as Garner's vice president following an emphatic victory over Philo Wallace, the former West Indies opening batsman.

"I'm humbled by the result," Riley said. "It is a vote of confidence in my work. I hope that I can continue to work with the cricket development committee to ensure that we have our Centre of Excellence in place in the next three months.

"I believe people realise that I work hard and I think they are convinced that I am someone that can serve Barbados' cricket."