Drakes wants foreign WI coach

BRIDGETOWN: Former West Indies fast bowler Vasbert Drakes is embracing the possibility that the West Indies coaching job is set to go to a foreigner. After Gus Logie’s contract was terminated last month by “mutual consent,” reports surfaced that the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) was about to appoint a foreign coach. Details of the employment of a new coach should be announced soon and while a non-West Indian taking over this crucial aspect of the region’s cricket has not been an altogether popular prospect with the fans, Drakes believes it could be a good thing. “At the end of the day you have to look at the best person, who could actually bring results to the West Indies team,” Drakes said Tuesday night, as a guest on the “Best & Mason” cricket talk show on CBC Radio. “Don’t forget, in the past 15 years we had (our own West Indies) coaches, and they haven’t really gotten the best out of the players, we haven’t gotten the results that the public wanted and that we wanted, so that’s the area that we have to focus on,” Drakes added.

Since the mid 1990s, the West Indies have slipped significantly down the world ratings, in spite of having some regional legends guiding them —like Andy Roberts, Malcolm Marshall, and very briefly, Sir Vivian Richards. Roger Harper coached the side before Logie took over in 2003. “You’ve got to be realistic, if you are dealing with the global market, you are dealing with the best people available because we are competing against international sides,” Drakes said. The 35-year-old Drakes, who last represented the West Indies in January on their South Africa tour, suggested that fans reacting negatively to the prospect of a foreign coach, should remember that other nations have used Caribbean coaches in the past to help develop their game. “If you go back to some of our great cricketers, they have been coaches or involved in cricket outside of West Indies, what about those people that they coached, if they were to view it from the same manner?”