WI men need a very good wicket-keeper batter very badly!

May 25, 2026 Sports

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By Colin E. H. Croft – Former Guyana, Lancashire CCC and West Indies Cricketer

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Kaieteur Sports – Any bowler, in any competition, format or team, even on the beaches, needs at least one player to always be on top of his or her game, at all times, for their team to progress and succeed.  That player is the wicket-keeper; not the captain.  The worst thing to happen to any bowler, whatever his or her skill levels, is to have a poor wicket-keeper behind the stumps.

The just concluded West Indies Men’s Four-Day 2026 Championship was convincingly won by Trinidad & Tobago’s Red Force, beating Guyana’s Harpy Eagles by 141 runs.  Did anyone notice that neither team got to 300 runs; not even close; in any innings in that four-day game?  Red Force 260 and 267; Harpy Eagles 247 & 139.  “De Force out-flying de doomed Eagles!”

Talk about batting mediocrity.  God help our cricket.  Only HE can change the poverty that envelops our regional cricket.  At least ten recent WI Test players, including highly heralded batters, were involved in that game.  Also, these two teams are supposed to have been the best in the Caribbean.  Oh Gaddo!!

Joshua Da Silva (T&T) & Tevin Imlach (GUY)

Ironically, the two opposing captains in that Final, T&T’s Joshua Da Silva and Guyana’s Tevin Imlach, are their respective team’s wicket-keepers too, even though Kemol Savory was sometimes Guyana’s wicket-keeper too.

Supposedly, Da Silva and Imlach are in high competition to be WI wicket-keeper for the upcoming ODIs, Tests and T-20s series against Sri Lanka, Pakistan and New Zealand, for the long upcoming Caribbean Cricket 2026 Summer.

To compound this quite underwhelming situation, one of these two is touted to be the next WI captain against the teams touring the Caribbean this year.  What a thing!!

Former regional men’s wicket-keepers Deryck Murray (T&T), Jeffrey Dujon (JA), Ridley Jacobs (LI), Junior Murray (WI), Carlton Baugh (JA), Randall Lyon (T&T), Courtney Browne (BAR) and David Williams (T&T); just a few; are probably regurgitating their breakfasts, thinking about the deep poverty of the Caribbean’s regional wicket-keepers-batters on show nowadays.

In any game, any wicket-keeper worth his or her salt, must keep their eyes on the entire game, at all times, while fielding or being back in the hutch.  Not even the captain does that.  Only the team’s wicket-keeper must do that; thinking, planning, scheming, explaining to batters and bowlers alike, 100 % of the time, as to what is necessary for success.

I remember interviewing Ms. Merissa Aguilleira, former T&T and WI Women’s Teams Captain and wicket-keeper: “Crofty, being a wicket-keeper is almost a 24-hour job.  Always planning, always learning, always plotting, always being involved, always looking for angles and weaknesses.  It is very tiring!”    She is not wrong.    Wicket-keeping is very difficult indeed.

But what exactly are the claims to fame for Joshua Da Silva and Tevin Imlach anyway?

Da Silva, 28 next 19 June 2026, slimmer now too, has been around for at least six years.   33 Tests, 1238 runs, avg. 24.76; highest score 100 no. v England, in Granada; 2022.   84 First Class Games, 4537 runs, avg. 35.72.  Highest score 220 v Leeward Island; 2026.  One hundred and five fifties in 33 Tests.  Those are just barely acceptable average returns.

Tevin Imlach, who will be 30 on 30 November 2026, is much worse off.  6 Tests, 169 runs, avg., 15.36, highest score 35 v Pakistan, in Multan; 2025.  40 First Class Games, 2090 runs, avg. 32.65, Highest score 136 N.O., v Jamaica Scorpions; 2023.  No Test 100s; no Test 50s!

Those batting stats are so poor; tail-ender numbers poor; that even if Tevin Imlach was Spiderman as a wicket-keeper, which he certainly is not, he should not be playing for WI with those dastardly poor batting stats.  Nowhere in the cricket world are those standards acceptable.  Tevin Imlach must have some “God-Father” somewhere in Caribbean cricket!

The rest of the wicket-keeper batters in the 2026 WI Four-Day Championship were Lenico Boucher (Barbados Pride), Romaine Morrisson (Jamaica Scorpions), Jamar Hamilton (Leeward Islands Hurricanes), Rivaldo Clarke and Carlton Bowen-Tucket (West Indies Academy), and Noelle Leo (Windward Islands Volcanoes).

Some made good scores, but as combination wicket-keeper-batters, none distinguished themselves.  A few also showed promise as pure wicket-keepers, but more consistency is required to be considered for higher station.

Being an average wicket-keeper is not acceptable anywhere anymore.  Being that, plus being a very poor batter, has never been acceptable anywhere since WI first played Test cricket in 1928.  No-one of present day Caribbean wicket-keeper-batters gives any real confidence.

My Wicket-keepers from Guyana, West Indies & Lancashire CCC

From 1972 to 1982/3, for Guyana and WI, and for Lancashire CCC, I played with some good, some not so good, wicket-keepers; late Milton Pydanna (GUY), Stephen Banfield (GUY), Lonsdale Skinner (GUY), Deryck Murray (T&T), late David Murray (BAR), Jeffrey Dujon (JAM) and late John Lyons (LAN).

Except for late Milton Pydanna, who had no self-confidence at all, which undermined his efforts to get to the heights and achievements of Deryck Murray, David Murray and Jeffrey Dujon, the rest were confident, even if not always up to levels required for the task at hand.

In my opinion, Skinner should not have been selected to play for Guyana but his inclusions were due, in part, to the lackadaisical approaches of Bamfield and especially Pydanna.

There were four wicket-keepers, who never made WI teams, who had the most effect on my initial efforts to be a good fast bowler.  (1) Kemraj Chanderpaul, known as “Cow-Fly”, father of Shiv Chanderpaul; (2) late Monilall Chanderpaul, known as “Bun”, Shiv Chanderpaul’s uncle; (3) Geoffrey “Reds” Murray; all Guyanese; (4) Ron Faria, the late T&T opening batter.

Deryck Murray assisted me a lot once I had bridged that massive gap to play Test cricket.  He even facilitated some of my operational cricketing foot-wear.

Kemraj and the late Monilall were fishermen by trade who only practiced, at Mahaica Hospital Ground, four hours a week, but they had magnificent eyes, wonderful hands and tremendous reflexes.  As teenagers, we borrowed their boats, to catch crabs at the mouth of Mahaica River, for our Unity-Lancaster villagers.    Both were even called to Guyana’s Trials.

The late Ron Faria kept wickets for my T&T club, Paragon Hocket & Cricket Club, and opened batting for T&T too, during my Navigation training stint for my entire year 1975 stay in T&T.

“Reds” Murray was wicket-keeper at my Guyana club, Guyana Sports Club, and my Manager / Senior Air Traffic Controller, when I went to work at ATC in 1973.  He had only just abdicated being Guyana’s wicket-keeper that year, also just missing out on WI Tour to the UK 1973.

They all bellowed the exact same thing: “Line and length, Crofty.  Line and length.  Get the line right first.  Then you can always adjust your length afterwards.”  Simple bowling rules.

“Bun” and Ron must be turning in their graves, and “Cow-Fly” and “Reds” weeping in their morning coffees, at the state of the wicket-keeping, and batting too, present in WI cricket nowadays.  Even now, they might still be thinking of somehow making a comeback too.

To say that 100 % improvements are required in all departments of WI wicket-keeping and batting is a tremendous understatement!

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• Colin Croft, Joshua Da Silva, Tevin Imlach, West Indies, wicket-keeper

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