By RON FANFAIR
Ave Mogan had a lot to celebrate last week.
Besides securing a new job, the longtime cricketer and administrator won the International Cricket Council (ICC) Best Women's Cricket Initiative award for the Americas region and was named captain of the first ever Canadian team that will take part in this year's West Indies Women's championship in Jamaica in July.
"Definitely, it was one of the better weeks for me in a long time," admitted Mogan. "To have so many positive things going on in your life at almost the same time is something that I really appreciate. In a sense, I feel blessed."
She was among a distinguished group of administrators, coaches and cricket clubs from 26 countries rewarded by the ICC for their efforts in developing the game beyond its traditional borders.
"You could say this is validation for all the work I have done to put women's cricket on the front-burner," said Mogan. "It's a real honour to be recognized by such an esteemed body as the ICC."
Mogan, the only woman cricketer to have played in the Toronto & District Cricket Association (TDCA) tournaments, was nominated for the prestigious ICC regional award by a panel that included ICC Americas Manager Martin Vieira.
"Ave has almost single-handedly kept women's cricket alive in this country for many years," said Vieira. "As a player and administrator, she has made major contributions to the advancement of the sport and fully deserves the award."
In addition to Mogan, the Manitoba Cricket Association was honoured with the Best Overall Cricket Development award.
ICC Global Development Manager Matthew Kennedy said he was delighted with the worldwide impact of the awards.
"These awards recognize excellence in cricket development and it is fantastic to see that the regional winners have been selected from so many countries," Kennedy said. "The global spread of entries bears testament to the success of the ICC Development program since its inception in 1977."
The global award winners will be announced at the end of March.
Mogan and the other regional award winners will each receive a specially commissioned ICC Trophy and a Certificate of Recognition. She is one of five Ontario players named in the historic Canadian squad that will travel to Jamaica this summer for the Caribbean series.
"After the U.S. players pulled out of the proposed Americas line up that I was trying to put together to go to last year's Caribbean tournament, I vowed that I would endeavour to get a full representative Canadian side," Mogan, who represented Guyana in the tournament as a 14-year-old in 1977, explained.
"I made a phone call to someone in British Columbia who played the sport to see if there was any interest and was wonderfully surprised to learn that they had active players up there who were eager to accept the challenge."
The full Canadian squad is Ave Mogan, Janet John-Dorie, Muneshri Persaud, Shoba Singh and Jennifer Sundralingam (Ontario) and Lenore Davis, Claire Abbot, Chelsea Baker, Kim Coulter, Meara Crawford, Anne Davis, Kate Duke, Shelley Fathers and Helene Gaffney (British Columbia).
Frank Persaud (Ontario) and Anne Davis (British Columbia) are the coach and manager respectively.