President of the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) Chetram Singh has refuted suggestions that the GCB executive overturned the selectors original nomination of Ramnaresh Sarwan in favour of Shivnarine Chanderpaul as skipper of Guyana’s Red Stripe Bowl squad.

Singh yesterday said that the appointment of Guyana’s captain for this year’s Red Stripe Bowl Limited overs competition scheduled to begin in Antigua on October 1, was done through a process.

In an invited comment, Singh disclosed that the national selectors had nominated the dependable Chanderpaul for the position and the Guyana Cricket Board executive concurred with that decision.

In a Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) report (online) yesterday, Singh is quoted as saying that if Sarwan had been guaranteed the vice captaincy of the West Indies senior team for at least a period of three years, then he would have had a stronger claim to be captain of Guyana.

The report quoted Singh as saying that Chanderpaul had been Hooper’s deputy all along and his appointment was nothing else but natural progression.

The GCB president told Stabroek Sport that of recent the West Indies vice captaincy had been a `fluid’ position with the appointment of Ridley Jacobs and Wavell Hinds and now Sarwan.

“It’s not like if they have told Sarwan he would be vice captain for the next three years,” Singh was quoted as saying by CMC.

Sarwan was Brian Lara’s deputy during this year’s Cable & Wireless series against Australia and Sri Lanka in the Caribbean but he had not led the Guyana senior side and was looking forward to the opportunity to enhance his chances for the top post if or when Lara exits the world cricket stage.

On the appointment of Sarwan as Demerara captain for the Inter-County one-day competition ahead of Chanderpaul, the GCB president said that was a decision made by the Demerara Cricket Board (DCB).

“That was a DCB thing,” Singh said, adding, “I don’t want to get involved with their affairs and how they selected the Demerara team and captain, but what I can say is that the selection of Chanderpaul was done by the Guyana selectors (Joe Solomom, Alfred Maycock and Lennox Hunte) and the executive of the GCB concurred with that decision.”

Asked about Chanderpaul’s ability as captain of Guyana, Singh said that it was not so much his ability as captain, but that such an appointment must follow a process and that process was duly followed as alluded to earlier.