Barbados Clubs: 1998 Cup scrapped (19 May 1999)

19 May 1999

Barbados Clubs: 1998 Cup scrapped

The Barbados Nation

The problem-plagued 1998 Barbados Fire & Commercial Cup Cricket Competition is to be discontinued.

The news came five months after the tournament had been stopped because of a High Court injunction which was discontinued in March.

At a Press conference yesterday to launch the 1999 Shield and Cup competitions, Barbados Fire & Commercial managing director, David Deane, said a recommendation had been put forward to the Barbados Cricket Association (BCA) to discontinue last season's Cup competition.

BCA president Tony Marshall later said it was more than likely that the sponsor's recommendation would be accepted at the board meeting this evening.

"The BCA is obviously going to pay a lot of attention to the sponsor's wishes," Marshall told NATIONSPORT.

"We are meeting (today) and the matter will be clearly finalised, but I do not see how we can go against the wishes of the sponsors."

It was also recommended that prize money allocated for the 1998 Cup competition be distributed among the six clubs still in the competition when it was halted. They are ESA Field Pickwick and ICB Empire, who reached the semifinals; United Carlton, BCL, Cable & Wireless BET, and BDF.

Deane said the recommendations were made following a meeting between the sponsors and senior club representatives in which they were able "to obtain some consensus".

The competition had been stalled after a series of protests that eventually led to Cockspur Wanderers going to court.

The Court of Appeal, however, discharged the injunction on procedural grounds in March, paving the way for the BCA to continue the competition.

Pickwick and Empire had already qualified for the semifinals, but two quarter-final matches were still to be played.

Those matches involved Carlton and BCL, two teams which advanced as a result of Wanderers being penalised for fielding a player who was deemed ineligible to take part in the tournament.

Source :: The Barbados Nation