“The cream rises to the top while the tail wags the dog!”

Apr 03, 2011 Sports

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Colin E. H. Croft
That India and Sri Lanka got to the final of ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 was no coincidence.  Despite tremendous pressures, as hosts, they have been the teams that have played the best, most consistent, attractive cricket overall during the tournament.  Sometimes, the cream actually does rise to the top!
Sri Lanka, admirably led by Kumar Sangakkara, managed to put all that has happened in their country recently behind them, to qualify for the knock-out stages with exactly the same points – nine – as India, whose captain, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, realized that India’s greatest motivators were 1.2 billion people!
With two of the world’s best cricketers ever – Sri Lankan wonder spinner Muttiah Muralitharan and Indian batting sensation Sachin Tendulkar – up against each other for the very last time internationally, the final match-up was perfect; zillions of runs fighting against zillions of wickets!  What a way to exit!
We are extremely lucky to have lived during this time.  We will never see the likes of those two again!
Those not withstanding, these teams have many diamonds.  Most have sparkled for ICC CWC 2011!
Which team anywhere in the world would not give their molars for an opening pair like India’s Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag, or Sri Lanka’s Upal Tharanga and Tilikeratne Dilshan?
Or a middle-order to match India’s Gautam Ghambir, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, Yuvraj Singh, and M. S. Dhoni, or Sri Lanka’s Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene, Thilan Samawareera and Chamara Silva? The respective bowling attacks, led by India’s Zaheer Khan, Munaf Patel and Harbhajan Singh, or Sri Lanka’s Lasith Malinga, Ajantha Mendis and Murali, are nothing to sneeze at either.
That more than one-quarter of the world’s eight billion population – over two billion people – managed to watch, listen, or be otherwise involved in that India v Sri Lanka final is great testament to cricket’s popularity.  No-one can complain that cricket has not had its most brilliant outing ever.  It certainly has!
For more than one un-cricket reason, I had hoped that Pakistan would have, at least, qualified for yesterday’s final.  That country has been so ravaged over recent decades, with natural and human disasters, and man-made wars, that they deserve special mention and credit to have played that brand of cricket, given the circumstances of their lives, not to mention the ‘spot-fixing’ charges that still exist against three of their best, young cricketers.  The Pakistanis should raise their heads with great pride!
Not so West Indies.  Even before the team had left Asia, the public team bickering had started.  It is as if everyone is “taking a head” in the stakes of passing the blame first.  There will be much more in the near future, I am sure, as an ‘investigation’, if any, is carried out as to our ICC CWC 2011 performance!
Meanwhile, as if that was not enough, West Indies Cricket Board has again let itself down badly, with the staging of our regional four-day cricket semi-finals.  It is no wonder that our cricket is in such a mess.  Anyone does anything; whatever they want.  The tail is actually wagging the dog here in these parts!
Having decreed a few years ago that semi-finals and final of our premier regional four-day competition must be played at venues that were the premier cricket grounds in each participating country, obviously to suit the occasion, how come both semi-finals were hosted by University of West Indies grounds? The regional four-day cricket competition belongs to West Indies Cricket Board, especially now that it has no official sponsor.  Therefore, they should have taken charge of it.  To allow Trinidad & Tobago Cricket Board to schedule that semi-final at UWI SPEC shows, again, that WICB is extremely weak.  Like all incompetents, they would probably forget the message, but want to attack the messenger!
FYI, I had actually sent an e-mail to WICB inquiring as to the hosting of the regional semi-finals and the use of these particular cricket grounds.  To date, I have received no reply.  I probably will never get one!
Understand this.  Both 3-W’s Oval, Cave Hill Campus, in Barbados, and Sir Frank Worrell Oval – UWI SPEC – St. Augustine campus, Trinidad & Tobago, are excellent venues.  There is nothing wrong with them at all, with their ambiance of old-style English university cricket grounds.  That is beside the point!
Neither is the premier cricket arena in the hosting countries, with Combined Campuses and Colleges hosting Windward Islands, while T&T hosts Jamaica.  Kensington Oval, Barbados, and Queen’s Park Oval, Trinidad & Tobago, are.  Both have also recently used considerable monies to upgrade themselves!
Even Gus Logie, former T&T and West Indies batsman, who is Jamaica’s head coach, has queried the use of UWI SPEC instead of QPO.  He makes a great point, noting that any player worth his salt would want to experience, at least once, that special feeling of playing at one of the best Test venues in the world.
Also; note; some players that appeared for West Indies, in that first game, against Pakistan, back in CWC 2007, had never played at Sabina Park.  That should never happen, especially for ‘home’ cricketers!
I have even had very much to do with UWI SPEC itself, as I had been its first Facility Manager, for the 1st three years of its existence.  I love the place, as I did have some considerable input of the arena’s design, preparation and appearance for ICC CWC 2007, with the venue brilliantly hosting some of the warm-up matches.  Also, I will give some lee-way to CCC, since its home cricket ground is indeed the 3-W’s Oval.
As we speak of Combined Campuses and Colleges, the authorities, captains, coaches, and especially players of both Barbados and Guyana, should hang their collective cricket heads in abject shame.
With their cricketing pedigree and history, to be sixth; Barbados; and eight and last; Guyana, in an eight-team tournament, should send severe tsunami-like, seismic shudders to their respective Cricket Boards.
How could some ‘pick-up’ players, put together as a team because they are temporarily attending and studying at one of our tertiary education centers, be better than those supposedly established cricket entities that are especially Guyana and Barbados?  This is another tale of the tail wagging the dog!
CCC has been excellent in the competition, with some players; Omar Phillips, Carlos Brathwaite, Kavish Kantasingh, for example; outstanding.  They did well to head the group after the preliminary rounds.
They may still not get to the final next weekend, if Windward Islands have anything to do with it.  However, very few, if any, of CCC’s players, would have played for their respective countries otherwise!
Neither Guyana nor Barbados should have any excuses either.  Ramnaresh Sarwan and Shiv Chanderpaul, for Guyana, and Kemar Roach and Sullieman Benn, for Barbados, might have been missing, being away on ICC CWC 2011 duty.
That does not diffuse the absolutely poor cricket that has obtained by these two supposedly mighty regional cricket nations.  Barbados and Guyana need severe internal inspections and reviews if their cricket is to be the fortresses that they have been in the past!
West Indies plays Pakistan and India in the next several weeks.  We are in for a very torrid time!  Enjoy!

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