Vanuatu cricketers-cum-seasonal workers pick fruits during the week, improve their craft in the weekend

Vanuatu Cricket is on the rise thanks to a first-ever partnership signed between the federation and Brisbane-based labour hire company, Icomply.

The partnership now provides the opportunity for local cricketers to work in Brisbane at the company's premises while getting the opportunity at the same time to play the game there.

It also allows the players to join the national teams when they are needed, like at the recent ICC Women's T20 World Cup qualifier in Abu Dhabi.

Vanuatu Cricket chief executive Tim Cutler said they are forever grateful to Icomply and chief executive officer Rodney Prestia.

He said the arrangement has meant continuity for the national sides, especially when their players can return to play when they are needed, even if they are away working.

"In the past we had what was basically a black hole where Vanuatu would lose elite sports people but for the last 10 or 12 months now the Vanuatu Cricket Association has had a strategic partnership with Icomply," he said.

"And they come back but they've also been able to train and play as well, meaning that cricket hasn't lost its cricketers when they go off overseas to work."

Cutler said the arrangement has worked well, with some learnings also from the recent experience in Abu Dhabi.

In a statement on his company's website, Prestia said they were excited to be helping Vanuatu.

The company has even gone further to start a cricket academy that would ensure Vanuatu or Pacific Islands players who play the sport can be able to work and still play the game they love.

"This partnership has enabled the majority of the men's and women's cricket teams in Vanuatu to undertake seasonal work while also competing on the weekend in Australian competitions," Prestia said.

"It has also given the players facilities and access to cricket pitches unavailable in Vanuatu.

"The formation of the Icomply Cricket Academy has resulted in specialised teams for both men's and women's representatives of Vanuatu to play against some of Australia's elite cricketers, gaining invaluable experience whilst also earning a great income to support their families.

"Icomply has also formed partnerships with Cricket clubs in Townsville and Stanthorpe so that these elite sportsmen and women can integrate into the community and compete for various clubs in those regions on weekends."

To date, the national reps have taken leave from seasonal work with the support of Icomply to compete in tournaments representing Vanuatu in Malaysia, New Zealand, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Dubai.

Cutler shared the unique partnership between Vanuatu Cricket and Icomply with RNZ Pacific:

RNZP: It looks like a very busy year so far for Vanuatu Cricket. Can you take us through what the year has been like for you guys?

Cutler: This year has seen the birth of something new for cricket in Vanuatu that sort of linked really closely to the seasonal work that occurs with a lot of Vanuatu men and women going off to Australia and New Zealand to pick fruits.

In the past we had what was basically a black hole where Vanuatu would lose elite sports people. But for the last 10 or 12 months, the Vanuatu Cricket Association has had a strategic partnership with Icomply, a labour hire company in Australia, thankfully owned by a cricket man called Rodney Prestia. The partnership has meant that our cricketers, both male and female, have been able to work in Australia and be able to earn money and send money back to either help their family or themselves.

They have also been able to train and play as well, meaning that Vanuatu Cricket has not lost its cricketers when they go off overseas to work and he has done similar things for beach volleyball players, which has seen them on the road to the qualifiers for the Olympics.

So, this year has seen for the first time that comes to fruition with the players that had been in Australia, being able to join their teammates who were still in Vanuatu to come together to play so it's still in its early days, but it has seen us really expand our footprint, meaning that we don't lose these players and we almost have two different departments. We have got the Vanuatu cricket team in Vanutau and then we've got another academy in Queensland.

The year started with the women headed to Auckland to take part in the Pacific Cup, which was a great initiative spearheaded by the ICC. It is a member-owned tournament and really well supported by New Zealand Cricket, meaning that once we landed in Auckland, the teams more or less did not have to pay for anything. Their hire cars were provided by New Zealand Cricket, who also paid for accommodation and food. And then all of our matchday costs and whatnot were taken care of.

For us, it was a great experience to come up against the New Zealand Maori team and also the quality that was there in PNG, as well as Cook Islands and Fiji. That was great for our women's team in their preparation and lead up to their first ever World Cup qualifier, which just happened in the UAE.

As we looked into February, our men's team headed off to Malaysia for a very important tournament called the ICC men's Cricket World Cup Challenge league playoff. It was an eight team competition but very important, because it meant the top four from that tournament requalified to be part of the 32 team pyramid in qualification for the next 50 over World Cup, and also brought with it quite a lot of funding for the next few years.

So, the top four re-qualified and the bottom four unfortunately dropped back out and then they only have a chance in another four years to qualify. For u,s it all came down to the last game. We scrapped our way into the super sixes and it all came to a do or die match against Italy on the final daily competition, meaning the winner of that game took the final top four position and the loser unfortunately dropped out.

Unfortunately, Italy just got past that acid score meaning that Vanuatu men have dropped out of the 50 over pyramid for the next four years. After that tournament we came up against some of the better teams in that competition in a separate T20 tournament with us, notching a win against Tanzania who were ranked about 13 places ahead of us on the global ranking. So that gave us a nice little bump. We did not get any other wins against the likes of Malaysia, Kuwait and Bahrain, who are all really good teams.

In March, we had our women's team, who had about six months since they went through undefeated, including the first time that they had ever beaten Papua New Guinea In September to win the regional qualifier, headed to Abu Dhabi for the ICC women's T20 World Cup global qualifier. That's the first time that any Vanuatu team has got to a global qualifier to that level and we had the likes of Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, Ireland, Netherlands and the UAE. We went into the tournament, hopeful of some good performances and lots of lessons to be learned.

But we probably didn't expect to get anywhere near to a win because we were playing against teams ranked higher than us. In game one of the competition, we came up against Zimbabwe, the first time of any Vanutau cricket team has played against a test nation in an international and we won. It was an amazing performance, especially from one of the players who had been playing in Australia, Nasimana Navaika. She took four and then scored some key runs as well. And also our all-round star, opening batter and opening bowler, Rachel Andrew took two wickets in two balls, including the Zimbabwe skipper, that that really turned the game. So that was a huge result.

It is no doubt in my mind that that is the biggest ever single result in Vanuatu sporting history, taking all the things into account, and the rankings of the sides. It was amazing to be there to witness that. We went on and we had three more more group games, which unfortunately we did ot win. The tournament ended just over almost two weeks ago now and sort of half of the women's team had come back to Port Vila, almost half have gone back to Australia to finish their contracts. Skipper Selena Solomon and all rounder Rachel Andrew are currently in Japan, playing in the Japan women's Premier League. So they will be there for another week, which is a competition organised by the Japan Cricket Association.

RNZP: What are your thoughts on what Vanuatu has achieved and what you need to be doing to continue getting into those playoffs and future World Cups?

TC: It is a really interesting looking at how they have actually performed. I think for them to beat Zimbabwe, it would have surprised 99.9 percent of the cricketing world out there. So many people do not actually know that Vanuatu exists in the first place, let alone that we have got this amazingly talented group of players that play cricket.

People will think that perhaps we'd be happy with that result. But I think looking back on it, and with this new partnership with the seasonal work perspective, there is still a lot of things that can be worked on better in terms of the understanding between players and the workers and cricket, as to the right balance of everything, and also the players being able to take more time for themselves to prepare.

I think that we really could have actually done a lot better even in this tournament with a different preparation. But it is one of those things that you only learn by actually doing them and then being able to review. This is a partnership that is basically a world-first. There has been no partnership of this kind between two organizations like ours to try and get the best out of for the players, both from a working in a cricket point of view. But I think the talent that's in the squad can do this again and we can get through the regional scene, which will come up next year.

And that will mean another seven-country competition amongst the whole region; that is Vanutau, PNG, Cook Islands, Fiji, Samoa, Indonesia and Japan, and the Philippines. I think they are actually looking to get a team in as well with their women's cricket growing, so it will be an eight team competition. That will be a tough competition. With the skills and experience that we've been exposed to in this competition I think, for our players, they have learned a lot from the recent event by watching good players play. I believe we are in much better position than we were before. However, there is still so much potential I see with this current group of players and the younger ones coming through.

RNZP: How big is the game of cricket in Vanuatu?

TC: Cricket is very much second place behind football. But it has really grown in the last 30 years, especially where it went from a bit of an outside sport played by some locals and a lot of expats to a game that is now played primarily by locals.

But like lots of sports it is maintaining the interest with kids in schools and we are running the programs to actually get them into clubs and staying in the game. Then having a sort of a long term relationship with the game, something we are looking at changing to make sure that we have got schools feeding into clubs and growing from there.

RNZP: How many players do you have working out of Brisbane at any given time during the season?

TC: With our general squads of our national teams we say this sort of 15 or 16 core players in our men's and in our women's; so a total of 30. We have had up to 20 people at any one time living and working in Australia in the middle of last year.

But because they generally are working on nine-month contracts, there's always a bit of crossover. So, from our women's squad, specifically, eight of our best 11 actually, who won the qualifier back in September, who are in Australia, and then with our men, there's been up to 12 different players that have been in our squads at different points within the last year or so that have been over there.

RNZP: You had two players from the women's team that were recognised at the recent tournament in Abu Dhabi. What's the reaction on them being recognised in an international competition like that?

TC: You got to be pretty proud to be associated with people like thisknowing the stories of these players coming through. Like Nasimana Navaika - to see someone like her, she's a single mum here in Vanuatu, working overseas away from her child, training to play cricket, going over to Abu Dhabi and being the leading wicket taker in the group stages is just amazing. Then to have Rachel Andrews' bowling called out by a Pakistan great in saying that was one of her favorite moments at the tournament as well, with two wickets and two balls to change the course of the game. It's great.

For me, it is not a matter of how many great stories we have to tell, because there are so many great storie. But when they are recognised by people who know the game so well and talk about it, it is just very satisfying to know that these people see the same things that I see and I know are happening here. All that does for us is just give greater exposure to the work that Vanuatu Cricket is trying to do in the community and beyond. Hopefully also giving these players opportunities to perhaps be picked up by franchises down the line as well.

RNZP: When is the next commitment?

TC: We have got tournaments in in August. We have got under-19 Men's regional qualifier in Samoa in the first week of August, and then our men's team are playing in a men's T20 World Cup sub regional qualifier. That will be Vanuitau, Cook Islands, Samoa and Fiji, only a week later in Samoa as well.

So that will be a huge month of cricket and a real strain on resources because they'd like any association we are always sharing resources across teams.

Prestia says Naviaka's request hard to turn down

Meanwhile, Rodney Prestia said he had met Nasimana Naviaka in Vila on a recruitment trip where the mother of one and cricketer asked if she could be given the opportunity to work and support her child.

That started a trip that has seen her return from the world meet with accolades and a lot more promise of a brighter future.

"Seven months ago on a recruiting trip to Vanautu, I was approached my a single mother that was seeking for an opportunity to come to Australia to support her little boy," Prestia said.

"She also played a bit of cricket and had to make the decision to walk away from her passion to support her child. We had a great conversation and said you don't have to do that you can do both. Her name was Nasimana Naviaka."

Prestia said Naviaka joined Icomply and began playing cricket on weekends in a domestic competion in Stanthorpe, while spending the week picking vegetables.

In Abu Dhabi she dominated on the world stage against the world's best and ended the tournament as the leading wicket taker in the pool stages. taking 10 wickets across 4 matches.

"I am so proud of all her achievements," Prestia added. "She has rejoined her Icomply teammates to continue her objective of supporting her child and proving that seasonal work and sporting dreams can co-exist with the right support structure."

Prestia also confirmed that they have also signed a partnership with Vanuatu Volleyball Federation, which has led to the establishment of the Seasonal Work and Sporting Dreams Pilot.

"This innovative project has resulted in elite sportswomen in the Pacific not being lost to seasonal work but having the opportunity to undertake seasonal work while continuing to not only play at a professional level representing their country, but also develop and harness their skillsets, resulting in improved performances and knowledge in their respective sports."

She said her company is proud to have some of the country's best beach volleyball players undertake seasonal work in Australia whilst continuing to train and compete at an elite level.

Icomply has built purpose-built beach volleyball courts to enable daily training and provides support to the elite sportswomen to travel on weekends to compete at elite sporting events throughout Queensland, she said.

"With the support of Icomply, the athletes have access to some of the best coaching and tournaments in Australia, thus enabling them to enhance their experiences so that when national duty calls they are in peak conditions, ready to represent Vanuatu with pride."