History was created on Friday evening at the Malteenoes Sports Club (MSC) elections when Deborah McNichol was elected unopposed as the first female President of the 119-year-old Thomas Lands Club, which was founded in 1902 by Barbadian tailor Ferdinand Archer.
McNichol, who has been an Executive member of the Club for eight years and a member for 18 years, is also the only woman at the helm of any cricket club in the Guyana.
McNichol, who served as First Vice President in the past Executive, has for her First Vice President, Shawn Holder with the Second Vice President being Steven Jacobs.
The other Executive Members are: Adrian Smith (Secretary); Denzel Alleyne (Treasurer); Shaquille Mosley (Assistant Secretary/Treasurer) and Sean Devers (Public Relations Officer) while former President Winton Semple and former national youth pacer and Coach Quason Nedd are the Committee Members.
McNichol, who has worked as a Public Servant for 43 years, said she was honoured to be elected as the first female cricket club President and emphasised that only with hard work and unity could success be achieved at Malteenoes.
“Our biggest challenge to bringing back MSC to its best days is funding and a decreased membership, but I am confident that this executive, elected in the middle of the pandemic, will work to promote the club as somewhere people would want to join and spend their afternoons once this COVID goes away,” the mother of three said.
Deborah McNichol is the first female President of a local cricket club
McNichol noted that her brothers played football and cricket while two of her sisters played hockey and the other one was into boxing and cricket.
Rich history
In 1987, MSC members Colwin Cort, Barrington Browne, Glen Robinson, Nigel Greaves, Shawn Holder, Sean Devers and the late Neezam Hafiz, dubbed the “Magnificent Seven” were part of the National U-19 team to tour Jamaica for the regional youth series and their selection is still the record for the most players selected from one club to any national cricket team.
In July-August 1993, under the presidency of Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) Executive Claude Raphael, MSC held the first National Cricket Academy for youths from all three of the counties in Guyana, with the out-of-town players being provided with accommodation at the club.
McNichol is flanked by her VPs while the rest of the executive stand behind her just after the elections
The club produced 27 national Under-19 players between 1975 and 2013, and 32 MSC players have played for the national senior team between 1909 and 2009.
The Thomas Road club has also produced eight West Indies players between 1930 and 2003, including West Indies Women’s player Indomattie Goordial, who was the last Malteenoes player to make her Test debut.
Cuthbert Monchoir, the Manager of the 1986 MSC U-19 team which won every national youth tournament that year, became the first Malteenoes member to do radio commentary in a First-Class match and write on cricket for the newspapers in the 1980s.
Devers followed in his footsteps becoming a Journalist and radio cricket commentator, and did the first of his 13 Test Matches at Bourda for CMC in 2001.
However, Malteenoes which held a scaled-down Academy in 2018, has not produced a national youth player since 2013 when leg-spinner Steven Sankar represented Guyana while Shemroy Barrington was the last MSC player to play First-Class cricket in 2009.
Under this executive, MSC will be looking to fix this problem by sending scouts to schools and when it eventually re-opens, getting youngsters to join the club.
