Dominica / Special Interests / Cricket

There are some who would argue that a day of quintessential cricket watching in the West Indies must entail a few hours spent at languor beneath the arbours of cannonball, samaan and bois kwaib trees in Roseau’s Botanical Gardens off Valley Road. It’s a splendidly intimate arena, the long term venue for domestic first class matches between the Windward Islands and the rest of the Caribbean, though slightly overshadowed now by the spanking new Windsor Park Stadium built alongside by the Chinese. West Indies played two inaugural one day internationals against South Africa there in 2010 to great acclaim but elsewhere on the island the difficulty in finding flat areas large enough for cricket has proved a problem.

There are two beautiful roadside grounds however near Grand Bay and at Macoucheri estate on the west coast, the HD Shillingford Ground, where the patrons are Dominica’s cricketing family dynasty. Grayson Shillingford was the first Dominican to play at the exalted Test level in 1969, followed by cousin Irvine before Norbert Phillip, Adam Sanford and latterly by yet another Shillingford (no relation), the tall rangy off spinner Shane. England’s Phil De Freitas was actually born at Scott’s Head, Dominica, where he spent ten formative years. Most of the larger villages islandwide will have whatever level pasture land is available set aside for cricket and recreation, and Dominica remains a great destination for the more adventurous type of overseas school or college cricket tour.