New format for Caribbean one-day tournament

The Caribbean's regional one-day competition, which takes place between October 8 and 24, will be played under a new format from this year. Only six teams - Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica, Leeward Islands, Trinidad and Tobago and Windward Islands - will be involved, meaning no room for Antigua and Barbuda, Canada, the University of the West Indies and the West Indies Under-19, although Antigua and Barbuda will rejoin the Leeward Islands team.

The first stage will be a round-robin tournament, and the top four teams will move into a Final Fours weekend with the semi-finals on the first day and the final on the next.

Last season, 10 teams took part in two zones with the top two in each zone going through to the semi-finals. Although this year there will be fewer sides, there will be more matches - 33 as compared to 23 in 2003.

"This hopefully will ensure more competitive cricket of a higher standard as well as increase the number of games available to the players as we build to the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007," explained Roger Brathwaite, the West Indies Cricket Board's CEO. "In the previous format, the teams reaching the final would have played a maximum of six games only. Now the minimum number of games for any team is ten."