ICC officials inspect National Stadium ahead of 2018 Women’s t/20 World Cup

Nov 04, 2017 Sports, https://www.kaieteurnewsonline...omens-t20-world-cup/

A team of officials from the International Cricket Council (ICC) arrived in Guyana yesterday and did inspections at the National Stadium, Providence, which is one of the potential venues for the 2018 Women’s T/20 World Cup that will be hosted by Cricket West Indies (CWI).
The event will bowl off in one year’s time from November 3-24, featuring 23 matches between 10 teams playing in eight CWI member countries. ICC Media and Communication Manager Sami Ul Hassan explained that the officials are inspecting a total of 11 venues from the eight countries and some of the things they’re looking at will be from playing, broadcast, spectator and operational perspectives.
Upon completion of the inspections, the ICC team of inspectors will submit their reports to CWI that will make the final decision on which venues will be used for the 2018 tournament, in a few weeks. Ul Hassan shared with Kaieteur Sport his satisfaction with a lot of the provisions at Guyana’s National Stadium and explained that, “The tournament is going to be extremely important to us (ICC) coming off the very successful 2017 50-over World Cup and the 2016 Women’s T/20 World Cup that saw packed stands.”
Reigning t/20 world champions, West Indies women, will relish the home support and fans all around the world will have the opportunity to view every single match.
Ruchika Rana, Broadcast Production manager of the ICC, stated that they were only scheduled to broadcast 10 games from the 2016 Women’s t/20 World Cup but they changed plans and televised all the games which was a good move because of the huge success of that and the following 50-over tournament.
She stated that production wise, all systems appear satisfactory at the Providence Stadium and hinted that next year’s event, which will be produced in Hi-definition, may see the inclusion of the umpire decision review system (DRS) along with spider-cameras.
Meanwhile, Marketing Manager of the Guyana Cricket Board, Raj Singh, in an invited comment, shared with Kaieteur some of the additional work that needs to be completed to bring the Stadium up to standard for their successful bid to host some of the games in the 2018 tournament. “There is a lot of work that needs to be done inclusive of repairs on seating, installing of an electronic scoreboard and a big screen. The projected cost of all the works is an estimated US$150,000 and Government’s support will be very pivotal.”
Along with Guyana, the other seven nations which will see their prospective venues inspected for an opportunity to host games in the 2018 Women’s t/20 World Cup are Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, St. Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, Barbados, Antigua & Barbuda and Grenada. (Calvin Chapman)