Congratulations to the Barbados cricket team on winning the inaugural NAGICO Super50 competition. The team was led by Kevin Stoute the son of local crooner Richard ‘Dick’ Stoute. The win was made interesting with the booting of leading batsman Kirk Edwards from the team before he got a chance to face a ball and a rookie captain who was appointed two weeks before the start of the competition.
The win by Barbados must however be placed in context. Those of us who watched the games witnessed poor pitches, poor umpiring, poor fielding, poor batting, hell even poor commendatory. The biggest irony to consider is the defeat Ireland inflicted on the West Indies today [19/02/14]. Bear in mind Ireland was a doormat in the just concluded NAGICO competition.
To be beaten by ICC Ireland in our backyard must be regarded as a another dark hour in West Indies cricket. In case you have forgotten, West Indies will be defending its ICC Twenty20 title in Bangladesh in March 2014. What a psychological dent this defeat must must have created.
Surely the WIBC must be willing to accept that the task of turning around rregional cricket falls outside its capacity after 20 years of trying? Viv Richards retired in 1991 regarded as our last successful captain. The management structure of West Indies cricket is clearly anachronistic and every minute it remains in control of the management of cricket its demise seems more assured.
West Indies cricket and the University of the West Indies are two of our regional entities which have made significant contributions to the region over the years, and continue to do so. The collapsing before our eyes of the UWI model and the inability of the WIBC to morph into a better way of managing the cricket makes one question the decision to pour millions into CWC2007. Why invest in stadia and infrastructure to the level we did as a poor region and not ensure (demand) that our management systems are modern?
Unlike the sport writers across the region BU prefers to focus on the bigger issue affecting West Indies cricket and avoid being ensnarled by the personalities. Why should an HR matter affecting Kirk Edwards be allowed to escalate to where both parties now find themselves? This issue like many others points to a bigger issue which the WIBC has refused to address. The fact that other cricket boards around the world have ‘’reengineered’ explains why they head the performance rankings and the West Indies team continues to languish near the bottom. There can be no argument against being described as a minnow.
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