CHRIS DEHRING yesterday dismissed as “erroneous” an Australian media report that questioned the West Indies’ ability to host the Cricket World Cup 2007.

“Far from concerns, the International Cricket Council (ICC) has been expressing quite a great deal of confidence in the ability of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and the Caribbean to host the CWC 2007,” Dehring, managing-director of the company established by the WICB to organise and execute the event, told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC).

“We have been working closely with the management of the ICC to put in place everything that is required...and they have been impressed at the level of preparation that the Caribbean has been undergoing to host the CWC 2007,” he added.

He called the report in yesterday’s Sydney Morning Herald and Melbourne Age, under the headline Windies World Cup in doubt, “erroneous”.

“We will be doing another presentation about our preparedness to the ICC president Ehsan Mani and chief executive Malcolm Speed when they travel to Jamaica next week,” Dehring noted.

“We have a schedule with which we are working and we will be sticking to this schedule,” he added.

“We will be signing our Host Agreement with the ICC at the end of the month and we know of no concerns the ICC has about our ability to host the CWC 2007.”

Dehring also answered charges that little or no excitement has been generated about the Caribbean hosting the CWC 2007 in the region itself:

“We are still 42 months away from the event and we expect that there will be a gradual build-up of momentum in individual countries,” he said. “From an organisational perspective, the kind of mobilisation that is taking place in many of the countries augurs very well for the CWC 2007.”