Island set to host first-class cricket

SUSSEX look set to play a first-class match in the island by 2012.

Sussex County Cricket Club and the Guernsey Cricket Board struck up a partnership in 2006 to help develop the game in the Bailiwick and to increase the professional club's talent pool.

The county's chief executive, Dave Brooks, was in Guernsey at the weekend for the first time in the role that he took up at the start of the year to have a look at what is going on here.

Clearly impressed, he stated that he wanted to see 'The Sharks', who are the reigning NatWest Pro40 League champions, play a Pro40 match or a Twenty20 Cup game against another county side within 'three to four years'.

'How cool would it be to have a Pro40 or Twenty20 game on Guernsey?' asked Brooks.

'We're trying to inspire the kids of Guernsey - they need to see proper cricket live.'

Sussex are sending their Academy team over in April to play two matches against the senior island side.

Keith Greenfield, who works closely with the GCB and joined Brooks on his visit, runs the Sussex Academy and they comfortably beat the Sarnians in a match at the county's headquarters in Hove last summer.

Brooks said the Academy team who will play Guernsey will be even stronger with a few contracted second-team players in the line-up.

If the matches go well, the idea then is to have the Sussex 2nd XI play a competitive match here against another county in 2010.