Windies cricket legends band together to plot end to WICB

Wed, Apr 20, '16

A HOST of West Indies legends including Garry Sobers, Viv Richards, Wes Hall and Andy Roberts have called upon the WICB to dissolve the board, in line with the CARICOM cricket review panel’s recommendation, and appoint an interim committee as part of the structural reforms that would enable the region’s cricket to “develop and flourish”.On April 14 in Grenada, converging under the umbrella banner of Cricket Legends, Sobers and Co. met with Grenada premier Keith Mitchell, chairman of the Prime Ministerial Committee on the Governance of West Indies Cricket, which appointed the review panel in the wake of the crisis that emerged after the West Indies’ withdrawal from India’s tour in October 2014.

Also present at the meeting were other former West Indies players – all-rounder Roger Harper; fast bowler Charlie Griffith; wicketkeeper Deryck Murray, who was also a member of the CARICOM review panel, leg-spinner Dinanath Ramnarine, who was previously the president of the West Indies Players Association (WIPA), and opening batsman, Desmond Haynes.Rudi Webster, who was the team manager during Clive Lloyd’s time and worked as a psychologist with current World T20-winning captain, Darren Sammy, was an invited guest.

Tearing into the WICB with the same vigour that they reserved for their opponents in their playing days, the Legends decried the board’s “oligarchic structure” which has remained “unchanged in attitude and structure” for the past seven decades.