his decision to defy a contract with the Bermuda Cricket Board of Control, which demanded that members of the ICC squad not participate in another sport.

Hill, who played in an Alliance Division match for North Village against Hamilton Parish exactly a month ago and scored a goal before coming off midway through the first half, suffered the full wrath of the board's displeasure with his actions when he was taken out of the Bermuda team.

Dexter Smith was named as Hill's replacement while Andre Manders joined Quinton Burch on stand-by.

However, just two days after the squad returned from Jamaica, Hill issued a release yesterday admitting that he "was foolish and extremely selfish''. He also confirmed that he has not gone ahead with legal action, which he had considered taking against the board.

Hill, 34, added that he did not rule out representing his country in the future, and said he wished the team every success in Kenya.

The release, which has also been copied to the Bermuda Cricket Board of Control, read: "I, Ricky Hill, would like to issue the following statement with reference to the affairs that led to my dismissal from the Bermuda national cricket squad presently about to embark upon their greatest venture ever, the ICC tournament in Kenya.

"The past few weeks have been among the most agonising that I have endured.

I've had time to sit and reflect upon the situation that I became embroiled in.

"I'm not going to go into any details of the incident as it has been well documented in the media. I hereby state quite categorically that what happened to me was of my own making. I do realise what I did was foolish and extremely selfish.

"I was thinking entirely of my own needs, therefore I would like to publicly apologise to me family, my fans, my team-mates (guys I really felt I let you down), the Bermuda Cricket Board of Control and their supporters.

"The bottom line is I'm apologising to the people of Bermuda. I'm truly sorry. Let me also state that I did not set out to deliberately defy the Bermuda Cricket Board of Control, in fact up until the time I made the serious error of judgement I was a regular and a committed member of the training squad and their goals. I hereby withdraw any pending actions against the decision made to exclude me from the squad.

"I would also like to wish the team every success in their quest to Kenya, I'm fully behind the squad going to Kenya. In closing, let me state that if there is any way that I can be of assistance to the squad in any capacity I would be more than willing to do whatever is necessary to contribute to the venture.'' Hill added that it was not his intention when he left home that Saturday morning to play soccer. He said that his conscience bothered him the whole time he was on the pitch.

"I went to a (cricket) training session at Devonshire Rec. that morning but did not train and was told by the trainer (Nick Jones) that I needed to get some work in that day,'' Hill explained.

"I just happened to go at Bernard Park to get some work in and North Village was short and I got involved in a game for 20 minutes. I started and came off, realising that I did have a commitment ahead of me.'' Hill did not play for Village yesterday in their win over PHC.

RICKY HILL -- `...what I did was foolish and extremely selfish.'