SANTA CRUZ, St Elizabeth — Organisers say the Twenty20 Legends Cricket Festival, featuring former West Indies batting stars Carl Hooper and Ramnaresh Sarwan and set for Sunday in Treasure Beach, is on track for success, much like last year’s highly satisfying inaugural event.

“Everything is falling into place,” lead organiser, former West Indies fast bowler Daren Powell, told the Jamaica Observer. “After last year we learnt a few valuable lessons and this year we gave ourselves more time to organise…it’s looking good,” said Powell.

An upbeat David Folb, operator of the Lashings Boutique Hotel and Villas, who, like other business leaders in Treasure Beach, is partnering with Powell on the venture, described the current feeling in the community as “incredible”.

“I see the excitement with everyone preparing, guest houses and other places filling up, and other business people getting themselves organised. Last year was phenomenal and I don’t know if this will be as big as last year, but the signs are good,” said Folb.

Thousands of people crammed into the BREDS Sports Park at Treasure Beach last year to see former master batsman Brian Lara as well as former West Indies opener Chris Gayle, who is among the top run getters in T20 cricket which took the world by storm just under 20 years ago.

At a personal level, Folb said he was looking forward to seeing Hooper whom he became good friends with at Kent in England many years ago. Hooper, a former West Indies captain and among the most artistic batsmen ever, played professionally in England in the 1980s, 90s and early 2000s.

Folb said Sunday’s event would serve as yet more evidence that “cricket is not dead” in Jamaica despite extreme pessimism in recent years.

Jason Henzell, longstanding community leader and chairman of Jakes Resorts and Jack Sprat Restaurant and Bar, argued — as he did last year — that the cricket festival is an ideal fit for Treasure Beach’s acclaimed community tourism product.

It also showed, he said, that “sports tourism is viable” and that much can be achieved through “partnerships and collaboration”.

Henzell, a major force in the development of the community group BREDS, as well as the sports park, recalled that “BREDS worked with the [St Elizabeth] Parish Development Committee to create a sports tourism strategy 15 years ago. The events we stage are targeted and deliberate in our overall mission of community development and making Treasure Beach a model for community-based tourism.”

On Sunday, Sarwan and Hooper, both Guyanese, are to lead opposing teams made up of a mix of older and younger local players starting at 1:00 pm. Powell was hopeful on Friday that star West Indies all-rounder Andrew Russell and colleague West Indies seam bowling all-rounder Odean Smith will play. He said “many” local players had come forward to make themselves available.

The feature game set for 1:00 pm will be preceded by Surrey All-Stars meeting Cornwall All-Stars, scheduled to start at 9:00 am.

Hooper, an elegantly dominant right hander, who is now 57 years old, played 102 Test matches for the West Indies in the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s, scoring 5,762 runs with 13 centuries for an average of 36.46. His off spin was often vital, snaring 114 Test wickets. Hooper played 227 One-Day Internationals (ODIs), scoring 5,761 runs with seven centuries.

Sarwan, 43, a dazzlingly quick-footed stroke maker, scored 5,842 runs for the West Indies with 15 centuries, averaging 40. His Test career ended very prematurely in 2011. In ODI cricket, Sarwan played his last game for the West Indies in 2013 after scoring 5,804 runs including five centuries at an impressive average of 42.67.

Powell said those attending will find much-improved arrangements at the sports park, including expanded parking arrangements. He is urging patrons to obey signage and follow instructions from security personnel. Spectators are free to bring umbrellas and their own seating if they so wish, he said.