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JCA signs multimillion dollar MOU with UWI

Published:Thursday | December 5, 2019 | 3:53 AM
Jamaica Cricket Association (JCA) President Wilford ‘Billy’ Heaven (second left) and UWI Mona Principal Prof. Dale Webber (second right) sign a memorandum of understanding between the organisations at the Faculty of Sport at the UWI. Witnessing are (from left) JCA CEO Courtney Francis, UWI, Mona campus lawyer Carl Lawrence, and JCA’s Business Development Manager, Garth Williams.
Andre Lowe
Jamaica Cricket Association (JCA) President Wilford ‘Billy’ Heaven (second left) and UWI Mona Principal Prof. Dale Webber (second right) sign a memorandum of understanding between the organisations at the Faculty of Sport at the UWI. Witnessing are (from left) JCA CEO Courtney Francis, UWI, Mona campus lawyer Carl Lawrence, and JCA’s Business Development Manager, Garth Williams.

The Jamaica Cricket Association (JCA) today signed a multimillion-dollar memorandum of understanding with The University of the West Indies (UWI) Mona Campus.

Under the three-year agreement, both organisations will provide significant support to develop their respective areas of need – cricket facility and resource development for the UWI, and medical support, treatment and research for the JCA.

Principal of the UWI Mona campus, Professor Dale Webber, said, “We have a partner in the JCA and we’re going to take advantage of that partnership to take a look at our infrastructure. That’s the first and biggest contribution. From where we stand, the medical screening, medical counselling and medical management of players is an important part of keeping our national cricketers in top gear. The strength training which will take place will certainly get you (cricketers) delivering at peak performance.”

He added, “We do this in the University’s triple-A strategy. These are access, alignment and agility. This MOU creates access to current cricketers and others who wish to pursue sports to do so throughout the university. We seek to align with sporting entities and this MOU does that, and we are moving at pace to get this programme done quickly. It provides the opportunity for the players to become academics while playing the sport they love. We are helping to prepare you for life after the sport.”

JCA President Wilford ‘Billy’ Heaven also welcomed the partnership.

“At our 2018 JCA retreat we determined the development of strategic partnerships among some of our key performance indicators. Today, we are proud to be signing this MoU with the UWI; this is significant. It is a critical success factor which we identified. We have to create more partnerships which support the sustainability of our operations as a sporting entity. This MoU strengthens and highlights both organisations’ commitment to developing cricket and all those involved in the sport,” said Heaven.

“Under this MoU the rehabilitation of cricket facilities here at Mona up to playing first class matches fits right into the JCA’s mandate to create more high standard grounds and spectator-friendly facilities across the island. We are taking the cricket to the people, while inviting them to come to the cricket. The strength and conditioning workshops and research, along with scholarship opportunities for our players augurs well for our overall performance as well as the future of local cricket,” Heaven added.