WI local:Champs, As usual

Another local cricket season has ended.

And there were familiar champions emerging in the Courts/Suzuki Division 1 and Barbados Fire & Commercial Cup competitions which climaxed last weekend.

ICB Empire, the perfect blend of experience and youth, showed their superiority on the way to collecting their sixth Division 1 championship in the last 12 seasons.

Cable & Wireless BET, packed with a host of exciting players, admirably defended the Cup title in the final by crushing Empire by 157 runs.

Along the way, it was not entirely straightforward in predicting a winner in either competition.

Empire trailed the top three teams going into the 10th series of matches, while BET were upset by Intermediate team Dover in the preliminaries of the Cup and were forced to dig deep to overcome ESA Field Pickwick in the quarterfinals.

Empire and BET did not prevail by strokes of luck.

They won because of their desire to win and because they knew what was required to win.

Winning becomes easier when it becomes a habit and Empire and BET were clearly able to produce when it mattered most.

During the early phase of the Division 1 competition, Banks, Pickwick and United Carlton were the front-runners and all spoke optimistically of going on to win the title that had eluded them for some time.

Pickwick had not won for four decades, Carlton for almost 20 years and Banks last won in 1986.

The three teams were not accustomed to winning and were unable to deliver the knockout blow.

Pickwick had the benefit of their last five matches at home, but did not gain significant points from them and ended the season with a defeat against Spartan.

They narrowly missed out on beating BCL and surely would have beaten St. Catherine had bad light not ended the match.

Carlton, too, stumbled in the closing stages. They gave away crucial maximum points to Empire in their 10th series match in which first innings lead was not even decided up until the final day.

Like Pickwick, they were frustrated in the penultimate series when YMPC's last wicket pair denied them full points.

Banks, who boasted of the season's top wicket-taker, record-breaker Winston Reid, suffered a similar fate against Police in the same series.

While Pickwick, Carlton and Banks were making no progress, Empire moved into high gear by beating Carlton and the two school teams down the homestretch.

In the Cup competition, Pickwick and Carlton also showed early promise before losing to BET at the knockout stage.

All credit must go the BET for that sustained onslaught against Empire at Kensington Oval. One must agree with Brian Johnson in his assessment that they are the best one-day team in the island.

They should have lost to Pickwick in the quarterfinals, but their varied bowling attack defended a modest total. And when Carlton chose to bat first against them in the semifinals, they wiped them away for just 60.

There were some negatives during the season that need to be highlighted.

There were far too many instances when players were not at the ground and were forced to forfeit their innings.

In some cases, players had genuine reasons for not being present, but it must be a cause for concern among officials.

Showing dissent to umpires' decisions was also on the increase and it is time the authorities give consideration to using match referees in the Division 1 competition, as is the case with the Fire Cup.