Windies 14 sign to play

BRIDGETOWN: The 14-man West Indies squad selected for the first Digicel Test have declared their hand — they will play. By 9 o’clock on Wednesday night, 13 of the 14 selectees had signed match/tour contracts ahead of a five-day training camp which began yesterday morning. The receipt of the signatures almost certainly eliminates the possibility of a strike by players who might have been in solidarity with the seven Cable & Wireless contracted players deemed ineligible to represent the West Indies.

As West Indies Players Association (WIPA) president Dinanath Ramnarine and secretary Desmond Haynes prepared to meet the players at Accra Beach Hotel late on Wednesday night, WICB chief executive officer Roger Brathwaite revealed that only one signature was outstanding, that of young fast bowler Jerome Taylor, who was due to arrive in Barbados yesterday after a medical assessment in his native Jamaica. “I don’t want to speculate on anything WIPA may have been doing. All I can speak to is that the players are eager,” said Brathwaite. “They are here. They are committed to playing for the West Indies and have indicated that commitment by signing the match/tour contracts.” He was speaking moments after the players emerged from a team meeting and just before they joined Ramnarine and Haynes for another meeting.

“The fact that the players have turned up and they are eager and looking forward to representing the West Indies speaks to what has been going on,” Brathwaite said. “Obviously we have a situation that not all the players are here - we understand those reasons why. Hopefully, at some point in the future when they become eligible, they will be taken into consideration. “We have the best team here available to represent the West Indies, guys who are hungry and looking forward to the opportunity of representing the West Indies and making a name for themselves in Guyana.” The receipt of the signatures from the players comes amidst the escalating crisis sparked by a war between rival telecommunications companies Digicel and Cable & Wireless. While Digicel entered into a five-year, US$20 million deal with the WICB as the new sponsors of West Indies cricket, Cable & Wireless, its predecessor, signed personal endorsement deals with seven players.

This led to the non-inclusion of the seven for the first Test against South Africa in Georgetown after the WICB’s lawyers deemed the contracts “clearly not in the nature of individual contracts and were signed as members of the West Indies team, while under contract to the WICB.” In response to the non-inclusion of the seven, WIPA stated that it may be left with no other “alternative but to take such actions as may be necessary to protect our members’ rights and the interest of West Indies cricket.”