President of the Bermuda Cricket Umpires Association Oscar Andrade has hailed the appointment of local official Emmerson Carrington to the ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup umpires panel.

Andrade described the appointment as a point of reference for the local programme and credited the ICC for their inclusive approach.

Carrington, an experienced umpire, who has officiated at several international matches and tournaments, was on Sunday named among the 19 appointees for the premier global age-group cricket competition, which takes place in the Caribbean from January 14 to February 5.

He was in the middle for Monday’s warm-up match between Scotland and Uganda at Everest Cricket Club Ground in Guyana.

“On behalf of the Executive and Members of the Bermuda Cricket Umpires Association we extend our congratulations and best wishes to Mr. Emmerson Carrington on his appointment as an umpire for the upcoming ICC Under 19 Word Cup, taking place in the Caribbean,” said Andrade in a media release.

Andrade underlined Carrington’s appointment as testament to the quality of officials from smaller cricketing territories and believes it will help to further develop the standard.

“This is a marquis appointment in Emmerson’s umpiring career to date after numerous previous very successful ICC appointments to other tournaments and competitions,” Andrade said.

“The ICC continue to show their confidence in Emmerson and also that the smaller associate countries are able to produce high quality officials that can compete on the world stage with the larger full member countries.

These appointments are important in the continued growth of the selected appointed umpires and also to promoting officiating within the various regions by showing that there are opportunities and pathways to officiate within the sport outside of each one’s own individual country,“ said Andrade.

The BCUA boss highlighted the efforts of his organisation in conjunction with the Bermuda Cricket Board, to provide its members with the necessary tools to perform at a high level.

“There has been much work done by the ICC in the past few years to standardise umpiring globally so that we all ‘speak the same language’ and the BCUA have stayed current with this effort and have modified our local training courses so that the transition from officiating in a local Bermuda match to an ICC match is minimal,” Andrade said.

“We, along with the BCB, actively monitor changes to ICC match regulations and MCC Laws and introduce these to our league playing conditions as soon as practicable so that Bermuda officials and players are already familiar with them before stepping foot in the international arena,” said Andrade.

The list of officials span 14 different countries and is completed by: Asif Yaqoob, Allan Haggo, Arnold Maddela, Buddhi Pradhan, David McLean, David Millns, Heath Kearns, Jacquline Williams, Mark Jameson, Martin Saggers, Nitin Bathi, Rahul Asher, Rashid Riaz, Rizwan Akram, Roland Black, Sameer Bandekar, Sarika Prasad and Vijay Prakash Mallela.

Graeme Labrooy, Phil Whitticase and Denavon Hayles have been named as match referees.

Sixteen teams will take part in the tournament, which is being hosted for the first time by 2016 champions, the West Indies.

This year’s competition is the 14th instalment of the tournament.

The teams are split into four groups of four teams. Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, England, India, Pakistan, South Africa, Sri Lanka, West Indies and Zimbabwe, qualified automatically for the tournament based on their finish at the 2020 competition.

Uganda, Canada, Papua New Guinea, United Arab Emirates and Ireland will compete as regional qualifiers, while Scotland replaced New Zealand after their withdrawal.

The West Indies will face three-time champions Australia in the opening match on Friday at the Providence Stadium in Guyana.