Twenty-four-year-old Dominican left-handed batsman Alick Athanaze has been named the Windwards Volcano Captain for the 2023 West Indies Championship.
The championship gives him the opportunity to begin his captaincy career for Windward’s Volcanoes in their first match of the 2023 West Indies Championship against the Trinidad & Tobago Red Force.
The match is expected to take place at the Grenada National Stadium, from January 31 to February 3, 2023.
The young Dominican cricketer made his List A debut for the West Indies U-19s in the 2016–17 Regional Super50 on 25 January 2017.
In the same year he made it to the West Indies squad for the 2018 U-19 Cricket World Cup.
It was after that tournament that many in the cricketing world noticed his talent as he was the highest run scorer and the second West Indies batsman to score two centuries in the same tournament.
Dubbed “the little wizard from Dominica” by West Indies Cricket, he finished the tournament with 418 runs, just short of the record of 421 set by Donovan Pagon.
The International Cricket Council labeled him the rising star in West Indies cricket and said he has the potential to be the first Dominican to represent the senior men’s team since Shane Shillingford in 2012.
After the 2018 U-19 Cricket World Cup, he returned to Dominica to a triumphant welcome.
In June 2018, he made it to the Cricket West Indies B Team squad for the inaugural edition of the Global T20 Canada tournament.
His first-class debut was made for the Windward Islands in the 2018–19 Regional Four-Day Tournament on 6 December 2018 and in October 2019, he made the Windward Islands squad for the 2019–20 Regional Super50 tournament.
In an opinion piece published in November 2022 on cricketwestindies.com titled “ALICK ATHANAZE – A STAR IS BORN”, author Machel St Patrick Hewitt wrote, “Having enjoyed West Indies A honors earlier this year against Bangladesh A, Athanaze is clearly a player on the selectors’ radar…”
Looks like the future is bright for this young Dominican cricketer.
The full Windwards Volcanoes squad for the first round of matches says:
- Alick Athanaze (captain)
- Preston Mc Sween (vice-captain)
- Kimani is better
- Jerlan Robinson
- I have Hodge
- Sunil Ambris
- Teddy Bishop
- Justin Greaves
- Tevyn Walcott (goalkeeper)
- Keron Cottoy
- Kenneth Dember
- Daurius Martin
- Nicklaus Redhead
