Without proper facilities, Bermuda cricket will never develop to the extent it should.

That was the opinion of the International Cricket Council?s high performance manager Richard Done, who has been in Bermuda for the past few days monitoring the national team?s preparation for the World Cup.

The Australian, a former first class cricketer and head coach at the Australian Academy in Brisbane throughout the 1990s, said he was generally pleased with the direction local cricket was headed.

But he warned Government?s unprecedented $11 million investment in the game would not have the desired impact unless Bermuda possessed a fully equipped One Day International venue, good quality wickets across the board and a decent collection of well-maintained nets.

?My one real concern about Bermuda in terms of its future development is the facilities,? he said.

?The money injected into the game by the Government is terrific, but the bottom line is that you really need to have the proper facilities in place as soon as possible if you are going to make the most of this opportunity.

?In an ideal world, it would be great if we could get an international team here in 2006 to play some One Day Internationals, but obviously there is no ground on the Island yet that has met the requirements.

?The National Stadium has a lot of potential. I know there have been quite a few problems with the pitch up there and I?ve heard that steps are being taken to get the right type of soil used.

?If the necessary adjustments are made, Bermuda could be in possession of one of the best facilities out of any of the Associate nations.

?Neil Speight is doing a lot of good work in terms of how the Board governs itself, but the priority from a cricket point of view has to be to get the facilities right and to do it quickly.?

Done has been the ICC?s high performance manager for 15 months now, having taken over from the highly-regarded coach of Pakistan Bob Woolmer at the beginning of 2005.

His principal responsibility is to ensure the five countries that qualified for the World Cup at the ICC Trophy last summer ? Scotland, Ireland, Canada, Bermuda and Holland ? are preparing as they should for their monumental assignment in 11 months? time.

As such, he will be working in collaboration with Gus Logie down in Trinidad next week, when a seriously depleted national team travels down to the Caribbean for a ten-day training camp.

Done said he had no intention of getting in Logie?s way during his time with the squad, but he will do his utmost to assist and offer a fresh perspective on what is required to succeed at the highest level.

?I don?t want to step on Gus? toes in any way, but there is a small coaching element to my job and hopefully I can help the players,? he said.

?I?ve just fulfilled a similar role with the Scottish team and while I was with them I had an opportunity to assess their players and work with some of the bowlers in the nets.

?So I?m looking forward to being around the Bermuda players for a few days and maybe a bit of a sounding board for any concerns or ideas that they have.?

The decision by the ICC to expand the number of teams eligible to qualify for the World Cup from three to five this time around has polarised cricketing opinion.

Some argue that the competition is being devalued and will ultimately be long winded and less entertaining because the higher number of mis-matches which could occur.

The ICC contend that their mandate is to promote and grow the sport on a global scale and the lesser nations will only improve if they are exposed to the highest quality cricket available.

Those against the policy ? who include among their ranks the Australian captain Ricky Ponting ? will be looking with intense interest at how the five perform next year to see whether the international governing body?s controversial policy has paid dividends.

Done?s task, therefore, is a significant one, and he admitted to being under quite a considerable amount of pressure.

When asked, however, whether he was concerned with Bermuda?s poor run of limited overs results since qualification was secured ? nine consecutive defeats to the likes of Scotland, Canada, Namibia and the United Arab Emirates ? he insisted that such disappointments were to be expected.

?Bermuda did incredibly well to qualify and are playing a consistently better quality of opponent than they were before,? he said, echoing the sentiments of Logie, who has vigorously defended his players against criticism.

?Like all these things they take time, and it was much the same for the likes of Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe and Bangladesh when they were elevated to Test level and have taken a while to find their feet.

?So it was not realistic to expect great things straight away. The advantage that Bermuda has over some of the other Associate nations, despite its size, is that cricket is part and parcel of the culture here which in my opinion, will make the transition to a higher level of cricket a much easier one.

?There is a bit of pressure on the high performance programme to deliver, but from what I?ve seen, the top level Associate members are in a position to be competitive at the World Cup, particularly against the lower level Test teams.

?It?s obviously unrealistic to anticipate a repeat of Kenya?s performance at the last World Cup (in South Africa) when they got to the semi-finals, but what we are looking for is gradual improvement. If it all goes wrong, then clearly there will have to be a review of the high performance programme and hopefully I won?t lose my job!

?We?ll have to wait and see but I think some of the games may well be a lot closer than some people expect.?