KINGSTON, Jamaica – Former Jamaica Tallawahs chief executive officer Jeff Miller said a lack of support from the government was the reason behind the decision of ownership to repatriate the franchise to the Caribbean Premier League.
Former Jamaica Tallawahs chief executive officer Jeff Miller (right) with Jamaica's Sports Minister Olivia Grange (left).Guyana-born businessman Kris Persaud recently sold back the Tallawahs to the Twenty20 league after six years, and he is now one of the driving forces behind the return of a yet-to-be-named franchise to Antigua.
“Over the years, we have failed to get any backing or support from the Jamaican government,” Miller told SportsMax.
“We have submitted proposals over the years requesting government support, and we have failed to reach some kind of agreement to say that the government is supporting the franchise.
“The business plan of CPL entails that the governments play a major role in financial support of the franchises and that’s what the other franchises are receiving from their respective countries, and Jamaica has failed to participate.”
The Tallawahs were a successful outfit on the field, being one of the two teams – Trinbago Knight Riders is the other – to have won the CPL title three times, but this and the allure of the biggest attraction on the Caribbean sporting landscape failed to spur the Jamaican authorities.
“Unfortunately, the franchise cannot be sustained in Jamaica,” Miller added. “We cannot have a franchise where we don’t have home games.
“When you don’t have home games, you’re losing ticket sales, you’re losing merchandising, you’re losing concession, you’re losing sponsors.
“So it’s not only the government support, you’re losing others as well because what business would want to support a franchise and they can’t get any benefits from the franchise playing within the country?
“For what we see, there were no games scheduled for 2024 either! It’s unsustainable.”
Miller said current Jamaica sports minister Olivia Grange was always supportive of the franchise, but there was a reluctance of the government to pay the CPL hosting fee to guarantee matches in the island.
“I’m not at privilege to those conversations,” he said. “Those conversations would’ve been between them and CPL. I’m not sure what transpired, but from the Tallawahs standpoint, we know that the minister was very graceful in her discussions with us.
“When it came to funding, that’s when things would go off track. We were promised on numerous occasions that there would be something in the budget, nothing substantial, but even a small gesture, we were not able to receive those funds.”
Miller said the focus now was to work on getting the franchise in Antigua up and running, and this included a public campaign to name the team to drum up support.
“We have commitments from the Antiguan government,” he said. “We can’t disclose any information, per se, but it’s substantially more than what we were getting from Jamaica.
“We can’t tell the players; Jamaica’s not supporting us, so we can’t pay your salary. All those things must be taken care of, so we’re looking forward to greener pastures and Antigua seems to be in a better position to support and seems to want to have a CPL team back in Antigua.
“We think it’s a good fit for the franchise. I’m engaging the fans in Antigua to participate in the naming of the franchise. That deadline should be around January 20th or so. Then, we will announce the name as well as the colors and logo.”
Previously, CPL operated the Antigua Hawksbill franchise over the first two years of the tournament, but the team won only three of 16 matches they played before they were eventually replaced by the St Kitts & Nevis Patriots.
