Timely series expected to boost women’s cricket, tourism for SKN

By Ryan Haas
SKNVibes.com

Warner Park being prepared for the England vs. West Indies women’s series

BASSETERRE, St. Kitts - THE women representing West Indies and England for their upcoming series at Warner Park arrived in St. Kitts on Saturday (Oct. 31), bringing with them a plethora of opportunities for the Federation.

The teams are slated to play three One Day Internationals on November 4-7 and three Twenty20 matches from November 9-12, all of which will be entirely free to the public.

Speaking to the press, the St. Kitts Cricket Association (SCA) said that the games coming to St. Kitts ahead of next year’s ICC Women’s Twenty20 World Championship offer a unique opportunity to boost women’s hardball cricket in the Leeward Islands.

“We want to use the occasion to promote hardball female cricket. As you know, there is a history of female softball cricket. So, we want to promote the hardball version here in St. Kitts and use the opportunity to promote it in our sister island of Nevis, as well as regionally.
 
“We think that hosting the games in the Leeward Islands, particularly in St. Kitts, will be the springboard for encouraging women to move in that direction,” said SCA President Conrad Kelly.

Currently, hardball cricket is not played by women in St. Kitts or the rest of the Leeward Islands, and Kelly said he hopes the England versus West Indies matches could be the first step in beginning about local and regional tournaments for females.

“We have sent the information out to the schools to try and get a lot of the students here so they can see that women do engage in hardball cricket very competitively at a high level. In the future, as an association, we would want to work with the Ministry of Sports and the schools…to gradually introduce hardball cricket at the primary and secondary levels,” Kelly stated.

SCA Executive Member Steve Saunders shared the opinion, and said that St. Kitts is happy to take the lead in female cricket.

“If it takes St. Kitts to be the one that starts such a competition and engage the other Leeward Islands, then so be it. Most definitely we will be taking our proposals to the Leewards board.

“Once we make our proposals to them, then we will see where we go from there,” he stated.

While the visiting team from England will no doubt be primarily focused on preparing themselves for next year’s World Championship and getting a feel for Warner Park where the preliminary rounds of that tournament will be played, Kelly said he believes they also came to St. Kitts after hearing about the nation’s famed hospitality from the male team following their visit last year.

“I think they wanted to come to St. Kitts because they heard about the hospitality of the Kittitian people and the select facilities that we have here to accommodate them, both in terms of the hotels and the cricketing facilities.”

He noted that the women from England would have a number of opportunities to enjoy the beaches and tour of St. Kitts during their stay, particularly due to the fact that they would stay a couple of extra days after the matches end.