To many, it may be news that the United States of America has a cricket team, let alone that they are on a training camp in Potchefstroom, ahead of a very important 2019 ICC World Cup qualifying tournament in Uganda.

But this was exactly the case when the USA Cricket team, composed mainly of amateur and semi-professional cricketers, made their way to Potch for the first time in history on 6 May.

Under the leadership of the coach, Pubudu Dassanayake and assistant coach, Trevor Penney, the USA would  like to progress their cricket to a level where they can compete and challenge the associate nations in cricket. The last time the USA Cricket team qualified for a major ICC tournament was the 2004 ICC Champions Trophy in England, and much has changed since then.

‘A lot of momentum has been lost in USA Cricket since that tournament for a number of reasons. But, the focus is now to get USA Cricket back to the level it can reach. This tour is a perfect example of this as we can now get game time and practise and train before the qualifiers in Uganda. This is something we could not do previously so we would have to go into the tournament under-prepared,’ said Dassanayake.

Dassanayake is an experienced coach, having taken Canada and Nepal to major ICC tournaments and having played international cricket for Sri Lanka as the wicketkeeper in the early nineties.

  ‘We have a talented team with a lot of variety and they like playing expansive cricket. We need to play more competitive cricket and this tour gives us the opportunity. There are big South Asian and West Indian communities in the USA. The interest is there, we only need more competition,’

The facilities here in Potchefstroom are fantastic and give us an ideal start in our preparations,’ he said.

‘Five of the USA players are playing in the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) as well, which is great for USA Cricket in general. Some games in the CPL are also played in Florida, which really grows exposure to the game in the States.’

The USA cricket team needs to finish in the top 2 in the WCL Division Three tournament in Uganda to progress to the next division of World Cup qualifying.

* The USA team played against the North West Academy team and won the match by 14 runs on the   Duckworth/Lewis method on Thursday.