WICB decide captaincy Sunday

ST.JOHN’S: The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) will decide on captaincy and other positions ahead of the 2003 Cable and Wireless home series at a directors’ meeting in Barbados on Sunday.

The WICB announced yesterday that the positions of captaincy, vice-captain, coach, and manager will be addressed at the meeting. “Appointments for the posts of coach, captain, vice-captain and manager for the senior West Indies team will form part of the agenda when the West Indies Cricket Board holds a directors’ meeting at the Accra Beach Hotel and Resort in Barbados on Sunday,” a WICB release stated yesterday. The WICB directors need to install a management team for the senior West Indies squad ahead of the Cable and Wireless 2003 Cricket Series against Australia and Sri Lanka that will be contested between April and July in the Caribbean. Based on contractual arrangements, all the posts became vacant following the Cricket World Cup (CWC) 2003 in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Kenya.

The long-term contracts of incumbent coach Roger Harper and incumbent manager Ricky Skerritt came to an end following the CWC 2003 and the WICB started the process of recruiting a coach and a manager last December. Officers of the WICB have conducted interviews with potential candidates for these two team management positions since the deadline closed on January 15 and the directors will discuss their recommendations on Sunday. The WICB, in their  release, predictably revealed nothing about the heated regional debate over Carl Hooper’s retention as captain after a miserable World Cup.

Selection chairman Sir Vivian Richards, who recently urged Hooper to stay on as captain when the 36-year-old Guyanese publicised thoughts about quitting, met with his selection panel last Friday to nominate a captain. “It is normal for captains and vice-captains to be appointed on a tour-by-tour basis and, the fact that a captain and a vice-captain is being considered now for the forthcoming Cable and Wireless 2003 Cricket Series, is nothing new for the WICB,” the release said. “The names will be forwarded to the directors for consideration also on Sunday,” the release said.

Other items of significance on the meeting agenda for the directors’ consideration are: a retainer contract system for players, and a report from Windies World Cup 2007 Inc.