Bermuda based insurer Ironshore has withdrawn its sponsorship of the Western Counties Cricket Association’s (WCCA) senior competition, citing a “lack of internal organisation and cooperation” among their reasons for doing so.However, they are keen to continue providing support for the WCCA’s junior programs under certain conditions.“We are still working with Kim (WCCA secretary Kim Jackson) et al to see if there is a way to maintain a relationship with WCCA junior teams through the Sandys 360 initiative in which we will be sponsoring junior swimming, basketball programmes, etc,” commented John Windsor, head of operations at Ironshore Insurance. “It’s the sponsorship of the seniors that has come to an end after five years.”Ironshore struck a partnership with the WCCA in 2007 with the aim of supporting the association in various ways in order to “build up and focus on the junior programme and youth development”.“This took off initially and then died down recently due to lack of internal organisation and cooperation in the last year or so,” Windsor said. “There was no summer camp last year and no focused youth proposals for this year.“We supported advertisement and the supplies/fees needed for the WCCA senior league as well as supporting the junior programme, however, in recent years their emphasis on juniors had dwindled which is what prompted our move towards Sands 360.“We’ve decided to take a more focused approach on youth development and have worked with the government administration to support Sandys 360 going forward. We had approached Western Counties to see about linking their juniors programme in with Sandys 360 to continue to provide support.”When contacted, WCCA president Gary Dowling said he was unaware that Ironshore had pulled the plug on its sponsorship of the association’s senior competition.“We have not had any communications to that effect,” he said. “We haven’t had any communication from Ironshore concerning that because we were in the process of putting together a programme (junior) with them.“Our treasurer (Cal Waldron) is in communications with Ironshore now so they can still support the programme at a different venue (Sandys 360).”Dowling acknowledged that Ironshore’s support in recent years has enabled his association to grow from strength to strength.“They have supported us one hundred percent and we have a had a great relationship with Ironshore,” he added. “We are very thankful for Ironshore assisting the Western Counties to move to the next level.”Windsor added: “We enjoyed working with the executives at the WCCA, some of our original partners have since moved on and we look forward to working with them in other avenues (Sandys 360 and Mirrors programme).”