Muirhead hints at Digicel renewing WICB sponsorship deal
NEW West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) CEO Michael Muirhead has confirmed that a new deal with team sponsor Digicel has been basically wrapped up while new and innovative ways of securing sponsors for the regional tournaments are on the cards.
Muirhead made the revelations after he was formally introduced to the Jamaican press at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in New Kingston yesterday.
“We haven’t signed the contract yet, but we are really in a very advanced stage. In terms of the team sponsor, Digicel will be the main sponsor. We are almost there,” said Muirhead, a Jamaican, who took over the CEO position from Dr Ernest Hilaire in October.
In 2004, telecom provider Digicel replaced rivals Cable and Wireless, now LIME, as team sponsor for five years and extended the deal in 2007 to 2012 worth approximately US$20m.
But with the three senior regional competitions, plus the Under-19 and Under-15 tournaments all without sponsors, Muirhead and his team say they are adopting new measures in securing not just one title sponsor per competition, but different convenient island sponsors for the different territories.
“The kind of approach we want to adopt is giving prominence to different sponsors in different islands, because if you seek a sponsor to do the entire series they may have different returns,” he pointed out.
“….Appleton may see better returns here rather than going into another island, while in another territory, there might be advantages for a local company. So we are trying some innovative ways in making it attractive to provide sponsorship for the various forms of the game,” said Muirhead.
“It’s a tough road and I can’t say we have landed anything concretely as yet,” he added.
Muirhead, 55, who is relatively unknown in cricket circles, is a graduate of the University of the West Indies where he gained a Bachelor of Science Degree in Management Studies.
After serving as a management consultant for PriceWaterhouse, Jamaica, he entered the financial sector where he spent eight years with National Commercial Bank (NCB) Group, serving in several senior management positions. He was also consultant managing director for the Financial Sector Adjustment Company (FINSAC). Muirhead also served as executive director at the Tourism Product Development Company (TPDCo) in January 2004.
He is currently a member of the board of directors of Victoria Mutual Insurance Company; the Jamaica Tourist Board; the Nature Preservation Foundation and TPDCo. He is also chairman of the River Rafting Authority, the body that regulates river rafting in Jamaica.
“I no longer consider myself all Jamaican, I am now a Caribbean man, a West Indian, as my responsibilities stretch right across the region,” he noted.
“Coming into the job as CEO is far beyond one that I thought it was, having accepted the job and getting to know the ins and outs of it. It’s not an easy task and there is much behind the scenes.”
During Dr Hilaire’s tenure, the WICB and the West Indies Players’ Association (WIPA) — under previous president Dinanath Ramnarine of Trinidad and Tobago — couldn’t see eye to eye on several issues leading to a US$20-m lawsuit currently before the courts.
“As an outsider, before I came in there were certain things I was critical of the board and one of the things that has haunted West Indies cricket in the recent past was the breakdown of relations between WIPA and, by extension, the players, and I am happy to say that since I have assumed the position I have had dialogue with WIPA and it has been one that I can say is zero animosity,” said Muirhead proudly.
“We are partners in this thing together, and without WICB there is no WIPA, and without the players, there is no WICB. So it is interdependent and we must recognise that we both depend on each other,” he reiterated.
Muirhead comes to the post with the WICB in a fragile financial state and with the new Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) and the Collective Bargaining Agreement with WIPA the subject of another court case