``As far as we are concerned, the Leeward Islands and Guyana will contest the final tomorrow.''
With those words, president of the Jamaica Cricket Association Jackie Hendriks and his committee of Red Stripe Bowl arbitrators yesterday served up a fresh bowl of misery to Trinidad and Tobago's Red Stripe Bowl cricketers. After leaving the Kaiser Sports Club ground here in Discovery Bay on Saturday secure in the knowledge that they had won their controversial semifinal match against the defending champions Leeward Islands on a faster scoring rate, the T&T team were relegated to the unhappy position of losers yesterday morning-by ten runs.
That new result, putting defending champions the Leewards into today's final was confirmed by the West Indies Cricket Board secretary Andrew Sealy.
But in yet another twist to this confusing tale, the local team was attempting to file a protest of their own late yesterday. And the possibility of filing an injunction to stop today's final was also being mooted.
Backed by legal advice from Jamaican attorney Howard Hamilton QC, T&T are arguing that the arbitration committee, which did not include the man at the centre of the controversy-match referee Hugh Perry-had no authority to overturn the decision.
T&T team manager Rangy Nanan was summoned to an emergency meeting Sunday morning at Portside Villa where he met with Jackie Hendriks Jamaica Cricket Association president, JCA secretary Roy Paul, Leewards manager Powell, umpires Thomas Wilson, Eddie Nichols and third umpire Basil Morgan. There Perry's decision was overturned.
However, contacted at home yesterday, Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board president Alloy Lequay argued that there was a basis for challenging the new decision based on an old case.
He cited this Shell/Sandals match between T&T and the Leewards in 1895 when the WICB overturned the ruling of match referee Ralph Gosine not to replay the match which ended in a no decision.
``The point of debate now,'' Lequay told the Express, ``is what authority has anybody to overturn the decision of a match referee when the rules say that the match referee's decision is final. They never altered the wording of the rule.''
The TTCB president added, ``we then got legal advice on the Gosine matter and we were told that the WICB was wrong and they could not overturn the decision of the match referee. But in this case, the match referee was not at the meeting.''
Perry, a resident of Port Antonio, had already returned to his home some 70 miles away.
However, Hendriks told reporters yesterday, the match referee had been contacted by phone and had admitted to his error.
Going strictly by the rules, the decision of Hendriks and company to overturn match referee Hugh Perry's decision to declare T&T the victors on a faster run rate was correct.
In their protest filed on Saturday evening and the argument presented at yesterday's meeting, the Leewards, through manager Carlisle Powell noted that the formula which was used was incorrect given the conditions of play.
That formula, which required T&T to have 136 runs after 32 overs when rain and bad light stopped play, applied to cases where the match was a full 50-over encounter, not a reduced 41-over match as was the case on Saturday.
Powell contended that Apendix B, (b)-A situation where the team batting first had to bat a lesser number of overs and the team batting second would have to bat even lesser number of overs-should have applied. In that case a mathematical formula should have been used which would have required T&T to score 148 for victory after 32, not 136.
``It is apparent that the wrong calculations were applied,'' Hendriks told reporters yesterday at the Portside Villa, after the meeting. But for an upset Nanan, those facts are irrelevant today.
He claimed that his team was misguided by the officials and should not be made to pay the penalty. ``Nanan added, ``yesterday (Saturday) we were declared winners of this game and all along we were guided by the umpires with regard to our target score,'' Nanan emphasised.
``Based on that, Trinidad and Tobago did achieve the target score.
And when the game was stopped for bad light and rain the umpires, the match referee, the secretary of the Association, the match coordinator, they all met and Trinidad and Tobago were winners by one run.''
Powell sympathised with the T&T position. ``It really is unfortunate that one of the teams had to suffer,'' he said.
``I would want to think that if Trinidad had been given the right calculations that they might have made a serious attempt to get the 148 runs in the 32 overs. I don't think they would have come off for light However, the Leewards manager was certain that the correct decision had been made.
``We did not have to make much of an argument because we did lodge an official protest last (Saturday) evening with Chris Dehring which he forwarded to the Jamaica Cricket Board, Powel said.
Powell and his team will be showing up today ready to play for their title. And despite their desperate effort, it is most likely to be at the expense of some aggrieved Trinis.