The West Indies team has learnt the art of consistent losing

Jul 03, 2023 Peeping Tom

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Peeping tom…

Kaieteur News – The crisis in West Indies cricket was not an overnight development. West Indies cricket has been in terminal decline ever since the end of the Vivian Richard’s era.

The decline in West Indies cricket is NOT due to the lack of world class cricketers. The West Indies were losing when it had players of the calibre of Jimmy Adams, Chris Gayle, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Brian Lara, Courtney Walsh and Curtly Ambrose. Even with those stars, West Indies were not dominating red ball and white ball cricket. So, it cannot be a case whereby we lacked quality players.

We have always produced quality players.  But after the Era of Dominance, we did not produce sufficient world-class players at the same time. If you look at the teams led by Clive Lloyd and Vivian Richards, many of the players in those teams were ranked in the top ten in bowling and batting. In 1981 for example, we had Viv Richards, Alvin Kallicharran and Gordon Greenidge in the Top 10. At least three of our fast bowlers were always in the Top 10 during that period.

Today, our present crop of players struggles to make it into those brackets. At present none of our batsmen or bowlers is in the Top 10 ranked Test players. But for all-rounders we have two in Kyle Mayers and Jason Holder.  We are in a worst shape in white ball cricket. None of our players, batsmen, bowlers or all-rounders, are ranked in the Top 10.

The metrics suggest that we need not just one great player to perform consistently in a team to make it dominant; we need about three players. At present we do not have this luxury.

The focus therefore has to be on building a balanced team. In white-ball cricket years ago, West Indies usually field one specialist all-rounder with Viv Richards doubling up as a spinner. These days we have three to four all-rounders in 50-over cricket. In the ongoing ICC qualifiers, the West Indies went into every match with at least 3 specialist all-rounders. This affected the team’s balance and ultimately its performance. Even when the team scored 374 runs, it could not defend this against minnows like the Netherlands.

Cricket has changed from the Era of Dominance of the West Indies. In those days, the West Indies Test and One Day International teams were virtually indistinguishable. But now there is almost a different red ball team and a white ball team. For a region as small as the West Indies, and with a limited pool of players to choose from, it is not advisable to have three distinct teams for T20, ODI and Test cricket.

Admittedly, the rules of ODI have changed to provide greater entertainment. These changes have encouraged the advent of more utility players, including the ‘finishers’ and all-rounders. But as we have seen with the West Indies ODI team, this comes at a huge price – not having penetrative bowlers and quality middle order batsmen.

Cricket West Indies has embarked on a development programme to encourage more players and have a larger pool of talent from which to select teams. But the converse approach might be better: build a strong team from the existing pool and the dominance of this team is going to inspire more persons to want to imitate the success of the team’s players.

At present, we have the core of a potentially strong team for Test and One Day cricket. We have two good openers in Kurt Braithwaite and Tagenarine Chanderpual with Alick Athanaze as a possible fill-in.  In the middle order, Shai Hope has the class to be a top player at both Test and ODI even though he has not done well in Test cricket. And there are some promising players who need the exposure to elevate their game.

However, it is the bowling department where the nightmare begins. Jason Holder is among the best all-rounders in the world but he needs a few yards of extra pace to be a more penetrative fast bowler.  Azari Joseph is developing nicely but apart from him, the cupboard is bare.

As such, the West Indies have to identify bowlers who can be penetrative and put them through a rigorous training programme under the guidance of the likes of Andy Roberts and Michael Holding.

One of the problems of West Indian cricket is that though the region has produced outstanding leg-spinners in regional tournaments, when they enter the West Indies team, they are not given the right encouragement and support to be successful. As a result, we have not been giving enough opportunities for the development of leg spinners.

Going forward, the focus therefore has to be on building a good team for Test and ODI from the present crop of players. The core of both teams should have the same players. Leave the T20 to the entertainment business. The team has to be balanced with good batsmen and penetrative bowlers. Unless this happens, we will continue to shatter the pride of our people.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of Kaieteur News.

 

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• Chris Gayle, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, the calibre of Jimmy Adams

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