New­ly ap­point­ed chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer (CEO) of Crick­et West In­dies (CWI), Chris Dehring, met with pres­i­dent Az­im Bas­sarath and oth­er ex­ec­u­tives of the T&T Crick­et Board (TTCB) as part of his on­go­ing en­gage­ment with re­gion­al stake­hold­ers.

Dehring, who as­sumed of­fice on Feb­ru­ary 1, 2025, em­pha­sized the im­por­tance of re­con­nect­ing with key fig­ures in West In­dies crick­et to bet­ter un­der­stand the cur­rent chal­lenges and op­por­tu­ni­ties with­in each ter­ri­to­ry.

In his re­marks, Dehring stat­ed: “While I’m no stranger to crick­et ad­min­is­tra­tion, the land­scape of the in­dus­try is al­ways evolv­ing so it’s cru­cial to reac­quaint my­self with the stake­hold­ers across the re­gion. Each ter­ri­to­ry has unique chal­lenges and op­por­tu­ni­ties and I want to en­sure that the vi­sion of CWI aligns with the re­al­i­ties on the ground.”

Dur­ing the dis­cus­sions at the Al­loy Lequay Ad­min­is­tra­tive Cen­tre in Cou­va, Dehring al­so stressed the im­por­tance of ter­ri­to­r­i­al boards in shap­ing the fu­ture of West In­dies crick­et. He added: “Ter­ri­to­ries are the core of West In­dies crick­et's pro­duc­tion line. Re­build­ing and re­tool­ing that pipeline to en­sure it is fit for pur­pose in the mod­ern pro­fes­sion­al sports world must be my fo­cus as CEO. Our strength lies in our uni­ty and shared vi­sion of all our stake­hold­ers—from ter­ri­to­r­i­al boards to play­ers, coach­es, and fans, notwith­stand­ing the healthy ten­sions that will ex­ist from time to time. If we want to com­pete at the high­est lev­el and en­sure long-term suc­cess, we must build strong part­ner­ships, in­vest in de­vel­op­ment, and cre­ate a sus­tain­able struc­ture that ben­e­fits every­one in­volved. In this re­gard, my role is not just about mak­ing ex­ec­u­tive de­ci­sions but about work­ing along­side all of you to shape poli­cies and in­no­v­a­tive strate­gies that will move the game for­ward for gen­er­a­tions to come. When our ter­ri­to­ries are strong, West In­dies crick­et is strong.”

Bas­sarath, who al­so serves as vice pres­i­dent of Crick­et West In­dies, wel­comed Dehring’s vis­it and reaf­firmed the board’s com­mit­ment to work­ing along­side CWI. He not­ed the fol­low­ing: “The TTCB ex­tends its full sup­port and best wish­es to Chris on this im­por­tant jour­ney. This meet­ing demon­strates our com­mit­ment to a shared vi­sion and marks a sig­nif­i­cant step in en­sur­ing that T&T re­mains a key play­er in the re­gion­al crick­et­ing land­scape. We look for­ward to col­lab­o­rat­ing with CWI to de­vel­op our play­ers, en­hance fa­cil­i­ties, and el­e­vate the over­all crick­et­ing struc­ture in the Caribbean. By work­ing to­geth­er, we can strength­en do­mes­tic pro­grammes and con­tribute to the con­tin­ued suc­cess of West In­dies crick­et.”

This en­gage­ment sig­nals a re­newed fo­cus on uni­ty and strate­gic plan­ning, as CWI and its ter­ri­to­r­i­al boards work to­geth­er to ad­dress chal­lenges, seize op­por­tu­ni­ties, and en­sure a bright fu­ture for the sport in the re­gion.

(Cour­tesy CWI Me­dia)