CHOPPING AND CHANGING IN WEST INDIES CRICKET

Jun 29, 2011 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

This is a depressing time for West Indian cricket fans… whatever little is left. The performance of the regional cricket team has been so depressing that many West Indians no longer care about attending matches or even watching the regional team on television.
Given the dismal performance of the team over the past few years, it is only the die-hard supporters, often relying on hope rather than confidence in the team’s ability, who are rooting for the team. West Indies cricket has gone downhill and there seems to be no end in sight for the decline.
Many coaches have been tried to no avail. New players have been introduced, but these new players have hardly been given a chance to secure a place in the team before it is again chopped and changed.
The latest player to fall under the axe is Brendan Nash, the vice-captain of the team. After playing just one test in the present series, he has been left out of the team for the second test against India.
It is not that he is out of form. In the second innings of the first test he got a shooter, compliments of another poorly prepared test pitch, and this sealed his fate. If Nash represents part of the future of the West Indies team make-up, then it seems rash to drop him when the team is in a rebuilding mode, more so considering that it is retaining a veteran of over one hundred tests.
Instead of Nash making way, some of the older players should have been retired. While they still can command a place in the team, their continued presence in the side will not be helpful to the rebuilding process.
The West Indies selectors are obviously chopping and changing in order to find the right combination. What the present crop of players need is a sustained run, so that they can gain enough experience to allow them to play at a high level internationally.
They need to spend long hours in the middle, and therefore the test series against India is ideal for this purpose. Yet, what we find is that instead of some of the senior batsmen being dropped to allow the younger players to have a chance, the senior players are being kept in the side at the expense of those in whose hands the future success of the team lies.
It is not always easy to drop a senior player. But some of the best cricketers ever to come out of the Caribbean were dropped even though they had many years of top class cricket left in them.
Roy Fredericks, for example, was let go even though he could have easily commanded a place in the team at the time. But in dropping him the West Indies selectors were looking towards the future.
The selectors of today need to look towards the future. They need to therefore begin to build a team for that future, and the more international cricket that the youngsters play, the better it will be for the team, because the present standard of regional cricket is simply not good enough to allow for an easy transition to the international level. As such, these future stars need to be groomed on home tours when conditions are far friendlier.
These decisions are not easy to make. And you can never please all the fans all the time. Even when the West Indies team was winning there was discontent about the final eleven, with some persons feeling that some cricketer or the other should have been on the team.
Chopping and changing, however, will not solve the problems of West Indies cricket. The talent may be there, but cricket has become far more professional today, and training methods at all levels need to be more professional.
Unless we accept the fact that the foreign teams have moved way ahead of us because they are more professional, we will not be able to catch up with the rest of the cricketing world. This is the harsh truth that we have to face, and the sooner we face it, the better for all concerned.
It is no coincidence that India’s rise in the test and one day rankings has been due to the higher level of professionalism that all of their players are exposed to within the IPL.
India is no longer relying on its domestic cricket, it has a professional league that has churned up stars, and some of the country’s top players have been left at home for the tour of the West Indies, simply to give some of the future players the necessary exposure.

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CHOPPING AND CHANGING IN WEST INDIES CRICKET

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