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ROSEAU, Dominica -- Tom Lafond, president of the Cavaliers Sports Club in Dominica, during a broadcast of the Leeward Islands-Guyana regional match, expressed serious concerns about the vision, objective, and strategy of Windward Islands selectors, by omitting West Indies Under-19 cricketer Kavem Hodge from the Windward Islands 2011 and 2012 team.

Lafond said that, after returning from the under-19 West Indies tour of India, where he achieved the second highest aggregate score of the series, second only to Craig Brathwaite, who went to make the West Indies senior team, Hodge should have been selected as a permanent fixture on the Windward Islands team.

“Kavem Hodge is the future of Windward Islands and West Indies, and all of us in the Windward Islands should develop a strategy to prepare him for West Indies and the first step begins with, making him a permanent part of the Windward Islands team,” Lafond said.

“Kavem Hodge scored a century in Australia against sensational teen fast bowler Pat Cummins, who is now a member of the Australian team. Craig Brathwaite is on the Barbados national team, Why is not Kavem Hodge on Windward Islands Team?” he asked.

Lafond said that it would seem that the Windward Islands selectors appear to have a history of marginalizing Dominican players. A few years ago before he died, Joey Carew said that, when West Indies selectors were getting ready to give Mervin Matthew a second look, Windward Islands selectors left him off the team, and ruined his opportunity to make the West Indies team.

He also noted that, coming out of the same Under-19 World Cup that Mervin Matthew dominated as a fast bowler, today Ravi Rampaul is currently a fixture on the West Indies team and Mohamed Sami was immediately called to the Pakistan team, while Matthew “was left languishing in the doldrums and at the mercy of some vindictive Windward Island selectors.”

He said the same thing seems to be happening to Hodge, and expressed the hope that Windward Island selectors take a closer look at the current players and recognize that Hodge, together with players like Johnson Charles, Gary Mathurine and Shane Shillingford, are the future of Windward Islands cricket and include them permanently on the Windward Islands team.

“Kavem has already demonstrated that he has what it takes to excel at the International level and has been playing more international cricket than the majority of the players on the team,” Lafond said.

The selectors, he said, need to refocus their objectives for building a winning team with Hodge.

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