Don’t expect to beat Aussies

THE EDITOR: The kind of welcome I have heard on the re-appointment of Brian Lara as captain of the West Indies, creates the impression to me that Australia is now the underdog in the upcoming one-day and test series.

I have never agreed that at the end of a series a captain is removed because the team lost. Sometimes I can appreciate that a captain’s tactics and strategy may be too defensive and can result in defeat or lack of success. But why remove a captain like South Africa’s Pollock. How many captains has England changed over the past few years? Has it made a difference to performance of the English team? Let me make an anology, do you remove the commander of an army, battalion, etc if he cannot defeat the Americans?

Then again, a captain on the field is only one person of a management team comprising manager, coach, vice-captain which make out a game plan, from game to game. What about the repeated selection of a player when he fails against bowlers like McGrath and Bret Lee, Akram, Rawlpindi Express, Mulalitheran. Lara may have replaced Hooper because of his very conservative captaincy methods, but I personally do not expect the West Indies to defeat Australia in either the Test or one-day series.

DESMOND  
ROXBOROUGH
D’Abadie