THE UNSUNG HERO

Dec 15, 2008 Editorial

Late Saturday night (Guyana time), playing on the other side of the world in New Zealand, Shivnarine Chanderpaul became the third highest scoring batsman of the West Indies in Tests.

He had long been the most prolific Guyanese batsman. In reaching 8077 runs, having contributed 76 to his team’s first innings of 340 in the first Test, he slipped past the 8032 accumulated by arguably the greatest cricketer to have played the game – the living legend, Sir Garfield Sobers. Ahead of him are two other living legends – Sir Viv Richards, the master blaster, with his 8540 and Brian Charles Lara, the Prince of T&T, atop of the pile with the mind-boggling accumulation of 11,953 runs.

Chanderpaul’s feat was accomplished without any fanfare and was spun out in an innings where he was the anchor of his team – the role which has often fallen on his slim shoulders of late – and the last man out.

With the departure of Lara, he has become the bellweather of the fate of the WI team: once he is at the crease there is hope in the breast of WI fans that at least respectability may be achieved. The ICC and the international cricketing fraternity recognised the achievements of Chanderpaul this year when they bestowed the title of “Cricketer of the Year” on him.

But somehow the acclaim that befits his attainments has not been forthcoming from the West Indian fans in general and indubitably not from his Guyanese compatriots. When he was honoured by the ICC, rather than awarding him the country’s highest award, Order of Excellence (OE), his own country grudgingly conferred the fourth ranking Golden Arrow of Achievement (AA).

At thirty four, playing the best cricket of his career, there is no question that he will surpass the achievements of Viv Richards by some distance – both in terms of total runs and in overall average. With all his (deserved) reputation for swashbuckling cricket, Richards’ average of 50.23 is only a razor thin advantage over Chanderpaul’s 49.08. What then prevents us from placing him in the league of “legends”?

We have commented on this issue before and repeat our argument, because in the failure of our community to give Chanderpaul his due recognition lies one of the clues for our failure to achieve more in the community of cricketing nations, even as we are acknowledged to be blessed with so much “potential”.

All of us who love West Indian cricket know that we have to get a grip on our decade-long decline.
There is a need for a modern professional approach – from the players, the coaching staff and the board. We also need a new defining philosophy. We have latched on to the notion of “calypso” cricket in which our fortuitous find of a seemingly never-ending stream of “stars” made us believe that our success could be effortless and also never-ending. We have experienced the ignominy of that misplaced dogma. Our new guiding philosophy has to be taken from the approach of Shivnarine Chandrapaul.

On Saturday night, as Chanderpaul passed the latest landmark, he was accompanied by a player from the young brigade – Jerome Taylor – who proved that the Chanderpaulian approach can be successfully emulated.

Taylor is our outstanding fast bowler but he always believed that he could contribute with the bat and practised hard at it. Before the New Zealand series begun, the new coach affirmed his belief in the capability of Taylor to become a recognised all rounder, and with his 106 on Saturday night, Taylor rose to the challenge. He had not even scored a first class half-century before.

Said Taylor afterwards: “Batting with Shiv gave me a lot of confidence. He supported me throughout and put faith in me from the start. He was in the middle talking to me and that helped me along the way. I was not thinking of the hundred, I was thinking only of occupying the crease and Shiv kept telling me, just hang around and hit the bad balls. He said ‘bat and bat and bat’.”

By us honouring Chanderpaul more appropriately, we would be sending a strong signal to our budding cricketers that the path painstakingly carved out by the young man though dint of sheer hard work and determination is the way to go. Give Shivnarine Chanderpaul his Order of Excellence.

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