…Tanveer, Walton, Ronchi retained
…Young players duly rewarded
By John Ramsingh
The player draft for the 2018 Hero CPL T20 Caribbean Premier League (CPL) took place on Thursday March 1 at Gfinity eSports Arena in London with many of the world’s top cricketers being selected for the tournament that will begin on August 8 at Providence.
The Guyana Amazon Warriors who finished third in 2017 have changed the formula as they look for a team that will bring their maiden title.
The three-time finalist has gone for experience and lots of youth which team owner, Dr Ranjisinghi Ramroop hailed as “an excellent move.”
At the start of the draft, the Amazon Warriors who were represented by Dr Ramroop and Operations Manager Omar Khan, immediately retained Pakistan’s left-arm seamer Sohail Tanveer who has been the spearhead of the attack for two consecutive years.
Their next pick was new-comer Shoaib Malik as the marque player for $USD130,000.
The tournament’s leading batsman in 2017, Chadwick Walton was next to be retained by the Warriors in round three at $USD 110,000.
Cameron Delport who is an opening batsman and medium pacer was next to be drafted and his selection was described by the franchise owner as value for money since he is a T20 specialist that is tried and proven.
The Warriors then retained all-rounder Rayad Emrit for his third stint before snapping up the effervescent South African leg-spinner Imran Tahir.
Consistent middle order right-hander, Jason Mohamed was retained as was New Zealand’s Luke Ronchi who came in as a replacement in 2017 and looked the part in four matches at the backend of the tournament.
Guyanese seasoned left-arm spinner, Veerasammy Permaul was the highest paid local player who was retained for $USD15,000.
After a steady debut season in 2017, Barbadian all-rounder Roshon Primus was retained for $USD10,000 while Windies players Shimron Hetmyer and Devendra Bishoo were inked for $USD7,500 each.
The Warriors then retained rising star, Keemo Paul as the Windies under-19 player while a new facet of the tournament saw Guyana Jaguars First Class batsman Akshaya Persaud being drafted as a Windies under-23 player.
Gajanand Singh was retained at $USD5,000 and will be joined in the squad by new comers Sherfane Rutherford and Romario Shepherd who had excellent returns for the Guyana Jaguars in recently.
Meanwhile, in an invited comment Dr Ramroop told INews that he is very pleased with the outcome of the draft as they look to the future.
“We have gone deep to invest in the youths who are in their prime as their recent records will show, so they are deservedly rewarded. Additionally, we have picked players that are expected to be available to us for the entire duration of the tournament (CPL) and not those who may have to leave due to international commitments,” Dr Ramroop stated.
The draft which lasted for just about two hours, saw Chandrapaul Hemraj being picked by the St Lucia Stars for $USD5,000 and Steven Jacobs by the Jamaica Tallawahs for $USD4,000.
Former Warriors players Chris Lynn went to defending champions Trinbago Knight Riders and Martin Guptill to Barbados Trindents.
Some other big names which went in the draft were Lendl Simmons and D’Arcy Short who were picked up by the Stars and Shahid Afridi and David Miller to the Tallawahs.
Hashim Amla and Shakib Al-Hasan are now with the Tridents after previously representing Trinbago Knight Riders and Tallawahs respectively while Kieron Pollard moves from the Tridents to the Stars.
This year’s tournament takes place between August 8 and September 16.
Trinbago Knight Riders are the defending champions and have retained most of their players from their winning campaign in 2017.
