BRIDGETOWN–The Gold­en Oldies World Crick­et Fes­ti­val, an in­ter­na­tion­al tour­na­ment for se­mi-pro­fes­sion­al and re­tired play­ers, will be held in the Caribbean in 2017.

Bar­ba­dos has won the rights to host the fes­ti­val which will run from May 6-13 in Bridgetown.

Crick­et leg­ends, Sir Garfield Sobers and Joel Gar­ner, have joined a del­e­ga­tion to pro­mote the tour­na­ment in Cape Town, South Africa, at this year's edi­tion of the fes­ti­val.

"What is par­tic­u­lar­ly in­ter­est­ing about hav­ing the 2017 Gold­en Oldies Crick­et Fes­ti­val is that it takes place dur­ing the month of May, which al­lows us to in­crease ar­rivals dur­ing a tra­di­tion­al­ly slow­er month," said Alvin Jem­mott, chair­man of the Bar­ba­dos Tourism Mar­ket­ing Inc. (BT­MI).

"No less than five ho­tels are ex­pect­ed to ben­e­fit from this event. In ad­di­tion, our sup­port ser­vices–restau­rants, at­trac­tions, car rentals, nightlife fa­cil­i­ties, etc–are ex­pect­ed to gain ad­di­tion­al busi­ness as the games are struc­tured as a fes­ti­val al­low­ing par­tic­i­pants to ad­e­quate­ly en­joy the host coun­try."

About 600 vis­i­tors are ex­pect­ed in Bar­ba­dos for the fes­ti­val, a brain­child of crick­et en­thu­si­ast Pe­ter Mc­Der­mott.

The Gold­en Oldies Fes­ti­val, which has been held in des­ti­na­tions such as Ade­laide, Birm­ing­ham, Bris­bane, Auck­land and Syd­ney is not lim­it­ed to crick­et but al­so has edi­tions cater­ing to rug­by, golf, hock­ey and net­ball. (CMC)