By BRENT STUBBS

Chief Sports Editor

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net    

It has been a while since the Bahamas men’s national cricket team has enjoyed any type of success on the international scene, but head coach Andy Moles believes this is the year that they can get back to some level of prominence.

At the International Cricket Club’s Men’s T20 World Cup Sub Regional Americas Qualifier in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the Bahamas is tied on top of the league points table with a perfect 3-0 win-loss record with Bermuda in the nine-team field.

“We’ve had really good success here,” said Moles, who hails from England. “A lot of people would not believe that we would have been able to achieve this, but the team has worked really well and has applied themselves with good skills and have shown to have good temperance in pressure situations.”

With five more games left to play, Moles said the Bahamas will need to finish in the top three to advance to the knockout stages to be held in Canada in August.

“We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves. You hear a lot of coaches talk about taking this one game at a time. Unfortunately, I will be one of those coaches at this stage,” Moles said.

“But we are really pleased to see that the team is doing well and we know that back in the Bahamas, the cricket fraternity will be very pleased with the way things are going and we know we have a lot of support. So we will do our best and hopefully give you more to cheer for in the coming days.”

The team, captained by Marc Taylor, includes Julio Jamison Javelle Gallimore, Kavorn Hinds, Dwight Wheakley, Rudolph Fox, Festus Benn, Dwifght Wheatley Jr, Sandeep Goud, Renford Dsvson, Sntonio Harris, Ashoir Nair, Romaine Smith and Eugene Duff.

According to BCA’s president Greg Taylor Sr, the team arrived in Argentina on Wednesday, December 4 and won their first match on Friday by 26 runs over Brazil 89/4-63/9. 

The team came back on Sunday and beat host Argentina by 18 runs, 119/8-101/5.

On Tuesday, the Bahamas won 117/5-114/6 over Belize. The team will now play Panama, Mexico and the Cayman Islands. “We just will go out there and play to the best of our ability and make the Bahamian people proud,” Taylor Sr said. “This is the first time that we have gone to a World T20 Cup Qualifier, so we’ve hoping that we can get to India to play in the final in 2026.”

The top three teams from this tournament will go on to play Canada in Canada in August, 2025 where the winner automatically makes it to the World Cup in 2026.

“We have a job to do and we’re playing our best,” Taylor Sr said. “We are playing to the best of our ability ,but we just have to wseip it up and play a little harder and higher and then we will be able to continue the winning streak.”

It’s an achievement that Moles attributes to the team’s dedication in their practice sessions. This is the third WT20 Qualifier that Moles has coached the Bahamas team in the three years he’s been working with the BCA. 

Each time, Moles spends at least 2-3 months preparing the team for competition and in preparation for this week’s tournament, he did the same thing.