Trinidad push for Carib Beer postponement

This season's Carib Beer Series has hardly gone without a hitch. It was originally due to start on November 11, but a fortnight before that date it was postponed and the number of preliminary matches halved to five. Now Trinidad & Tobago have tabled a proposal to delay the semi-finals and final by almost two months.

At the moment, the final is scheduled to start on February 17, but T&T have asked the West Indies board to postpone that until April 14 to allow players involved in the tour of New Zealand to participate. A decision is expected on Saturday when the board meets in Port-of-Spain.

"The basis of the argument was that the teams taking part in the semi-finals would prefer to have their Test players in their sides," cricket operations officer Derrick Nicholas told the Nation newspaper. "The second reason offered had regard to the cancellation of the Zimbabwe Test series. They feel you can fill that void with cricket. They want the best teams and best players in the semi-finals and finals."

But the Nation said that Hendy Springer, the Barbados coach, was very against the proposal. "A further break would be bordering on a joke. The guys need to continue playing," he told the paper. "It doesn't matter who is available from a West Indies perspective. All the teams have people who can represent their countries creditably. This season has been drawn out already. We need to play cricket as often as possible. It doesn't matter who plays.

"Once the teams are well represented, that is good enough for me. We've had a couple of breaks in the season that has done nothing for momentum and nothing for cricket and continuity."