Guyana’s Head of State questions Romario Shepherd’s absence from T20 World Cup team

A screenshot from Guyana’s President Irfaan Ali’s official Facebook Page questioning Shepherd’s absence from the T-20 Squad

President Irfaan Ali has thrown his weight behind Guyanese All-rounder Romario Shepherd, asking the question of why the Guyanese is absent from the West Indies squad for the World T20 later this year.
Via a facebook post, the Guyanese leader, no stranger to cricket, asked, “Why he [Romario Shepherd] is not in the West Indies T20 World Cup team?”

The Guyana Head of State continued by adding “His performance has been outstanding thus far in the CPL and there is absolutely no reason why this young All-Rounder should not be in the squad.”

President Ali is the latest in a long line of administrators and journalists heaping pressure on the cricket West Indies (CWI) selection panel as to why the all-rounder has been left out of the squad.

His comments came also on the back of the Guyanese’s glitzy 72 not out off 31 balls against the Jamaica Tallawahs revived the Guyana Amazon Warriors from 75-7 to 142-7 in the ongoing Hero Caribbean Premier League;

This is just the latest in a string of performances for the Guyanese who after seven innings (not counting the current game against the Jamaica Tallawahs), has hammered 108 runs at a strike rate of 168.75 and has fifteen wickets.

Chairman of Cricket West Indies selection panel head Roger Harper was quoted as saying, “Of course, consideration was given to Romario because I think he has been performing extremely well, and of course consideration was given and he just missed out on a spot.”

The West Indies squad has Kieron Pollard (Captain), Nicholas Pooran, Fabian Allen, Dwayne Bravo, Roston Chase, Andre Fletcher, Chris Gayle, Shimron Hetmyer, Evin Lewis, Obed McCoy, Lendl Simmons, Ravi Rampaul, Andre Russell, Oshane Thomas, Hayden Walsh Jr. Reserves: Darren Bravo, Sheldon Cottrell, Jason Holder, Akeal Hosein.