By the time you read this missive, dear reader, you’ll know whether the Warriors have moved into the playoffs against the Royals. Your Eyewitness had already asserted they’re going forward – so all that’s new is we now know they’ll be facing the Jamaica Tallawahs. And knowing that in this League we just can’t take anything for granted – we gotta remember that we split with them during the regular season – your Eyewitness hopes our Warriors are just waiting to take out their Royal-induced angst against the Jamaicans!!! That’s gotta be SOME motivation!!
They gotta forget any sympathy they may have for the Tallawahs, because the owner (Krish Persaud) and Head Coach (Shivnarine Chanderpaul) are Guyanese!! Right now, they’ve chosen to represent – and even lead – Jamaica, who’re standing in their way to their first championship. Can’t have THAT, can we?!! So, as far as your Eyewitness is concerned – to paraphrase another Guyanese – you can easier stop tomorrow that stop the Warriors’ inexorable march towards their destiny!!
So, right now, he wants to look at the bigger picture through a cricketing lens. There’s been some chatter that the unity and bonhomie shown by our GAW players towards each another aren’t really significant as far as our national ethos is concerned. That conclusion’s so off that it ain’t even funny !! It’s reflective of the question a great cricket analyst once posed to their ilk: “What do they know of cricket that only cricket knows!!??” Meaning, what goes down on the cricket field is only one aspect of what cricket’s all about!! The most important features lie “beyond the boundary”!!
Then some may scoff that the GAW is just a “franchise” team, and many of the players are “foreigners”. But what’s a “nation” in the modern world – including our Guyanese nation?? Isn’t it all about standing up to represent that nation?? Have the critics not seen the foreign players give their all for our cause?? Have they not seen Tahir, for instance, acknowledging his allegiance to the fans by kissing the Guyana flag on his uniform?? While these “foreign” players are representing Guyana, they BECOME Guyanese!!
But to turn our gaze to the fans in the stands brings out the most important lesson of our cricket – one that your Eyewitness has made from the beginning of the tournament. A nation is brought together by nothing more than an outside “threat” of any type!! It becomes “us” against “them” – with the “us” being us Guyanese as ONE!! Listen – all families will have their squabbles and spats – but when the chips are down, they’ll stand as one!!
And right now, that’s the lesson that President Ali’s emphasising when he turns out to the ball game and sits with the fans.
We’re all One Guyana!!
…gone from politics
If you really needed additional confirmation of the place of Warriors’ cricket in the Guyanese nation, have you noticed that even the political sniping has evaporated and the players of that nasty game have had to lie low since that first game at Providence?? Whatever else politicians might be, they know well enough that even if they speak one-on-one with their constituents – much less outsiders – at best, they MIGHT get some polite nods and a fixed smile!
Guyanese just won’t be listening to anything right now but Warrior Cricket!! Maybe that’s why the LoO chose to campaign in Canada during this period!! Discretion’s always the better part of valour!!
The business community bent to the gale force cricket sentiment and called for a holiday on Tuesday. They simply signalled their acknowledgement – especially the ones from Georgetown – that whatever they said, a significant chunk of their employees would call in sick to be at the game!!
…from the Cricket Carnival
As you know, your Eyewitness had some doubts about the “Cricket Carnival” when it was floated. His concern was the “carnival” would clash with the “cricket”.
But scheduling the early events in the periphery defused that!!
