Yet another WICB pipe dream
by LAWRENCE ROMEOWest Indian fans across the region and the wider world are trying to decipher this urgent press release from Dr. Julian Hunte, the president of the WICB. The release stated that the WI team, the flag carrier and symbol of unified English speaking Caribbean plus Guyana, has been threatened with relegation.
Suddenly, belatedly, the WICB is yet again in crisis mode and is sounding the alarm. Dr. Hunte in the release stated, "We need to synchronize all our various efforts and plans to achieve the short-term objective of getting higher up in the rankings..." While on paper this might sound like taking decisive action. In reality, it is yet another pipe dream – Dr. Hunte and the WICB tilting at windmills.
A team is only as strong or as competitive as its reserves, and right now, the West Indies have none. Again, Dr. Hunte acknowledges this when he states, "We have to widen our pool of talent, have a clearly stated and objective selection philosophy, increase the amount of cricket played at the regional level, and improve the standard of the players and teams in our tournaments, and we must do it all very quickly."
How can the WICB turn this around after years of neglect of the organization side of our cricketing structure by successive administrations? The, there is still the bubbling undercurrent of a Players Association whose militancy far exceeds the demands it places on its charges to shape up in the critical areas of fitness and performance. This crisis was 13 years in the making and nothing was done to arrest the slide.
Yet, surprisingly Dr. Hunte announces, and I quote directly from the press release - "The Board, at its next meeting on July 24 – 25, 2008, will deal with what Dr. Hunte considers a crisis in West Indies Cricket and will ask the Team Management, specifically Coach John Dyson, how they plan to improve the technical skills of the players to make them more competitive and improve the world ranking of the team."
I don't envy John Dyson; I hope his continued tenure does not hinge on the correctness of his answer, politically or otherwise.
Before Hunte puts this question to Dyson, maybe he should go through the mountain of managers and coaches reports gathered over the years. I'm sure he could gather some ideas of the way forward as far as the players are concerned. His time can be better spent in ginning up some new ideas within the WICB.
For example, how about a super pro club league? Set up two teams up to a maximum of ten in a few of the territories. Break them into zones to cut down on travel costs. Hold a draft and assign players from across the region to these teams, regardless of geographical origin. Sell franchising and advertising opportunities to businesses. The players from these teams should be attached to various local schools where they can coach when not engaged in matches. Appoint fulltime staff to each of these teams so in addition to training players you will also be exposing support staff to what professional level cricket is all about.
Of course, this should not replace the beloved Carib Cup, as we fans of the great game love to cheer for the players from our respective territories. The pro teams should be engaged in every type of cricket, from Twenty20 to four day matches. This will help to widen the pool of talent available to our team. Players and local coaches will be able to earn a living playing cricket.
All this could be preceded by the setting up of an Academy, or preferably academies, that takes the players through various levels of development, culminating in the best of the best moving on to a high performance center where their skills will be honed to make them future internationals, and which could double as a place for remediation of skills for internationals who might be struggling at the highest level.
Of course, the proposals briefly outlined above will not bear fruit overnight. We are still faced with the immediacy of the specter of relegation. Something that neglected and left to wither on the vine for so long, cannot be magically fixed overnight or at least in whatever timeframe the ICC will dream up. After all, it was they who started us on the slippery slope to oblivion with the ill thought out Future Tours Program (FTP), and its accompanying financial structure that penalized small market teams like the West Indies and New Zealand.
Judging from the attendance at the test and ODI matches in the ongoing series with Australia, Test and One Day cricket as viable forms of entertainment might well be dying before our eyes. We cannot expect any favors from the ICC. This is our baby, and if it is to be fixed, the solutions have to be grown organically amongst us.
Right now, the WICB should be flush with cash from the World Cup and rights fees paid by the Stanford Group. Do they have the vision, the strength and the wisdom to lead WI cricket out of this dark tunnel?
Only time will tell.