WI cricketers a product of the system

THE EDITOR: Judging from his performances over the last ten years, it is empirically safe to conclude that the West Indian cricketer is a sub-standard product. As a batter, he is unable to perform on the spinning wickets of India, he is at sea on the bouncy wicket of Australia, South Africa and even Labina, and he will certainly undermine the fine traditions of West Indies cricket on the wickets of New Zealand and England where lateral movement is par for the course. As a fast bowler, he is able to maintain line and length for as long as a snowcone in hell. As a spinner, he lacks the accuracy, guile and other subtleties to pressurise opposing batsmen. Altogether, he lacks the mental toughness and level of physical fitness that his craft demands.

The simplistic view is to scapegoat the players for their lack of commitment, lack of pride and a lack of talent. I beg to disagree. The real culprit is the system which produces these players. What is the reason that the modern Western Indian batter, spawned from a gene pool of supreme technicians and dancing master like Hunte, Kallicharan, Weeks, Greenidge and Worrell, has degenerated into a sluggish heavy-footed ugly duckling depending “dubiously” on poor coordination to ply his trade. How is it in the midst of Sobers, Hall, Robert Holding, Garner and others, no one was able to arrest the decline of the obviously talented Franklyn Rose, Reon King and Dinanath Ramnarine?

Pedro Collins is typical of the modern West Indian player. He took a whole lifetime to learn to “bring back one” from left hand over the wicket. As I write, we seem to have lost an exciting strokemaker in Wavel Hinds only because no one could help him solve his problem just outside the off-stump against the quicker stuff. Soon we will lose Chris Gayle too if no one could help him adjust his stand and delivery style. And all this is happening amidst a bunch of mocking pretenders waving coaching certificates all over the Caribbean from Trinidad in the South to Antigua in the North. None yet has shown the skill of a Rohan Kanhai. It is time to assemble a think tank of the brilliant minds. Certainly a sub-standard system will produce a sub-standard player.

The truth is the Caribbean cricketer is suffering from low cricket mileage. The format of the Caribbean Regional Competition, with its handful of games, could never produce test cricketers. The standard is too low. This must be supplemented by the work ethic of a professional Regional Inter-Club League with the free movement of players across the Caribbean. All — captain, coach, selector, administrator, player, et all — will have to produce or they don’t eat. We seem to have forgotten that our cricketers of the past received their cricket education in the professional league of England, and further, that it was the rigid professionalism of the Packer League which transformed the players of the Lloyd era into world beaters.

The name Clive Lloyd reminds me that a good captain makes a difference. Even his staunchest supporter must now agree that Brian Lara is not up to the job. To put it bluntly, he has undone the fairly decent job that Carl Hooper had started. The level of consistency expected from the bunch of young players has not materialised under Brian Lara. Apart from a few instinctive haunches his captaincy has suffered because too often he strays from the basics. Such an approach is dangerous for it might create confusion in the heads of the young players. But lets leave Brian Lara for Part II of the discussion.

BERNARD HART
Freeport