The failure of the West Indies cricket team to make it through to the semi final stage of the ICC T20 tournament appears to have caught West Indian supporters by surprise. One would have thought a team with the track record of the West Indies cricket team in the last 12 years would NOT have provoked such an uproar. Surprisingly even the unperturbed Captain of the West Indies Chris Gayle was driven to apologize to the West Indian people. Bear in mind, Mr. Duckworth Lewis was very generous to the West Indies in the preliminary game against England. Does anyone believe the West Indies would have scored 190+ to win that game?
As expected the region’s media has been having a field day carrying several opinions of regional cricket commentators echoing the plight of the West Indies team and offering the usual feeble suggestions to the way forward. In a nutshell, much of the outpouring of opinions and commentaries in the various media can only be described as high order flatulence aka bovine excrement.
BU was reminded to check the International Cricket Council (ICC) website to seek confirmation of the West Indies cricket team’s current world ranking. To no great surprise there was confirmation that of the 12 teams with ICC rankings, the West Indies occupies a distant number 8 position behind Pakistan with Bangladesh in tow. To paint the picture, the four teams which trail the West Indies cricket team in the ICC Rankings are: Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, Ireland and Kenya. Again, did we reasonably expect West Indies to win the ICC T20 competition?
It is no secret the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) has been in rebuild mode for the last fifteen years, since the glory years of the Clive Lloyd and Viv Richards era. The fact our teams have failed miserably for so long should reveal to our cricket administrators the urgent need to overhaul the blueprint; however no such luck if we are to judge from recent comments. Our administrators, media and fans continue to heap abuse on our captains, coaches, selectors and the WICB. The fact that we have sacked captain after captain, coach after coach, change selector panel after selector panel, and had new directors on the WICB Board in the last 12 years has done little to make clear the message that there are other issues which need to be addressed.
To be successful in the game today requires our cricketers to be consummate professionals. To become professional the system which we need to farm our cricketers must be designed, funded and managed to achieve the desired outcome, i.e. produce professional cricketers. Can a Barbadian cricketer who learns his cricket playing at Barbados Cricket Association (BCA) competitions or playing two day cricket on weekends, with the occasional regional competition thrown in, expect to compete successfully on a consistent basis with those teams at the top of the ICC Rankings? BU shouts loudly, NO!
Regional governments were suckered by first world governments into spending half billion dollars to build cricket stadium and infrastructure. A debt subsequent events has confirmed we cannot afford. Cricket is a sport which now competes with many others, especially out of North America. Our respective governments in the region cannot justify the current level of spending on cricket given the fading interest in the sport. Similar monies spent to improve football, a mass based sport would have been a more prudent decision. We however have some time for the other side of the argument that recent innovations in cricket on the limited-overs variety may breathe new interest into the game from non-traditional sources.
The point we hope to make is, the current model being used by the WICB is not working. Perhaps its lack of success reflects the dearth of leadership which prevails in the region. When all is said and done it is a game which has brought joy to West Indians. This is best summarized in the Dave Martin, Tradewinds classic Cricket in de Jungle.
And he turn to de crowd and he said very loud,
“let me tell yuh, allyuh talking about hit de man,
but allyuh backside inside de stand,
send some other jackass to bat, dis jackass finish with dat.”
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