West Indies Cricket Fans Forum
Martin Guptill and Lendl Simmons among the biggest names in CPL 2018 player draft
The first round of the Caribbean Premier League 2018 player drafts was held on Thursday (March 1), in which New Zealand opener Martin Guptill and his West Indian counterpart Lendl Simmons were the names that made the most noise. While the Barbados Tridents franchise picked the Kiwi opener for a contract of UDS 160,000, the Windies performer was selected by the St Lucia Stars for USD 70,000.
Among the stars who were retained by the franchise, they played last year were Jamaica Tallawah’s Andre Russell, St Kitts’ Chris Gayle, Knight Riders’ Dwayne Bravo and the others.
Kieron Pollard goes big
A total of six teams will contest the tournament, and each team can have a maximum of 18 players. On the first day of the drafts, 47 players were picked from the drafts while 61 were already retained. The tournament is being played since five years, but this year, the draft saw the most transfers in its history. The bigger transfer was that of Kieron Pollard, who led the Barbados Tridents for the past four seasons, but he asked the franchise to release him, St Lucia Stars made the most of his availability and snapped him for a whopping. $130,00Among those who did not enter the drafts by already negotiating the prices with their former teams were Shahid Afridi (Jamaica Tallawahs), Shoaib Malik (Guyana Amazon Warriors), Evin Lewis (St Kitts and Nevis Patriots) and Chris Lynn (Trinbago Knight Riders). Interestingly, legspinner Sandeep Lamichhane, who became the first Nepal player to be picked in the IPL last month, also became the first from his country to make it to the CPL. The St Kitts and Nevis Patriots signed him for USD 5,000. The teenage legspinner hadn’t set a base price before entering the auction.
The sixth edition of the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) will be held from August 8 to September 16.
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Guyana Diaspora Forum
We have a large database of Guyanese worldwide. Most of our readers are in the USA, Canada, and the UK. Our Blog and Newsletter would not only carry articles and videos on Guyana, but also other articles on a wide range of subjects that may be of interest to our readers in over 200 countries, many of them non-Guyanese We hope that you like our selections.
It is estimated that over one million Guyanese, when counting their dependents, live outside of Guyana. This exceeds the population of Guyana, which is now about 750,000. Many left early in the 50’s and 60’s while others went with the next wave in the 70’s and 80’s. The latest wave left over the last 20 years. This outflow of Guyanese, therefore, covers some three generations. This outflow still continues today, where over 80 % of U.G. graduates now leave after graduating. We hope this changes, and soon.
Guyanese, like most others, try to keep their culture and pass it on to their children and grandchildren. The problem has been that many Guyanese have not looked back, or if they did it was only fleetingly. This means that the younger generations and those who left at an early age know very little about Guyana since many have not visited the country. Also, if they do get information about Guyana, it is usually negative and thus the cycle of non-interest is cultivated.
This Guyana Diaspora Online Forum , along with its monthly newsletter, aims at bringing Guyanese together to support positive news, increase travel and tourism in Guyana and, in general, foster the birth of a new Guyana, which has already begun notwithstanding the negative news that grabs the headlines. As the editor and manager of the publication, I am committed to delivering Blog entries and Newsletters that are politically balanced, and focused on the positive ideas we wish to share and foster among Guyanese.
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