The Independent Voice of West Indies Cricket

West Indies Cricket: A Nuh Nutten

Wed, Oct 29, '14

by RAY FORD

Commentary

Jamaica has more churches per square mile, than any other country in the world. Go figure. And so what if I don’t know my Bible line-by-verse? A nuh nutten.

But there’s a passage which speaks to a man walking by a monument one day, and the next, it was a rubble. This reminds much of West Indies cricket.

It seems just yesterday, West Indies ruled the cricketing world. Today, it’s the scourge of it.

The time is too long gone, and the matter too much above my pay-grade to say who’s right and who’s wrong. But if I may borrow from Tony Becca’s last Sunday column, no party seems to be telling the full truth. And so when all the self-satisfying snouts have finished their vacuuming, there will be blame still left in the trough.



The days should have been long-gone when cricket teams leave home without a contract, and without acceptance of the terms of it. Buying puss-inna-bag is always risky business. But the West Indies players seem to have flown out to India, on an airline named, `Nuh-Worry-Yuself’. Major worries.

And after landing, and even after jet lag had cleared their foggy heads, the foggy numbers didn’t.

And why was the West Indies Cricket Board’s (WICB) plan so ambitious? Only Jesus Christ can feed multitudes by so few fish and so few loaves.

Man can not stretch fish and loaves. And if any attempt is made, it borders on the `hokus-spokus’.

In the financial world when too high interest rates are promised, book-cooks are working over-time in their kitchens.

One thing still tugs. The last election of the WICB president, pitted the stooped, the unsmiling, the tried, the proven, the steady and the known, against the young, the brash, the smiling and the well-oiled tongue, about whom virtually nothing was known.

I myself tried to find out who is this Dave Cameron. And the feedback I received made me a little nervous. Because, I was never any good at even playing orthodox spin. Much less googlies.

So nervous in fact was I, that on March 26, 2013 in a piece titled Put off that WICB Election I begged the cricket-Gods for clemency for West Indies cricket. Too late. The trap door was already being tested. And the hangman was getting anxious.   

And what of Dwayne Bravo? He’s at near the top of the list of West Indies cricketers, only sake of the alphabet. Not on strength-of-numbers. Should he have been the monkey to stop the show?

And who is Wavell Hinds? By all accounts, a humble, decent and decently educated chap, who was only looking to siphon from the trough to feed more than just the chosen-few. Not to drain it.

But how did he end up in th middle of rushing Times Square traffic? Was he pushed? Or, did he just wander?   

And what now of our relationship with India – cricket’s financial powerhouse?

India makes no bones about sending strong-armed men to break the feeble bones of those monkeys who break their rules or, don’t dance to their tune.

Mr. Cameron may now want to one night, bury the bankbook somewhere in the back yard, and quickly plant grass over it.

And within the squabble, there’s another squabble. Because, misery likes company. And so Dwayne Bravo is now reaching out to Marlon Samuels as a potential co-conspirator. Samuels in-turn, has now lifted his bat high above his shoulders, like how Gordon Greenidge used to. Make no mistake Mr. Umpire. I didn’t get a touch.

If West Indians all, can reduce West Indies cricket to a rubble, then not one Caribbean institution trying to promote values intrinsic, at the expense of the value of money, can be guaranteed any peaceful existence.

The new money-gorgons insist that the alphabet must now begin with `m’ as in money, and not with `a’ as in application, and followed by `b’ as in balance, and then `c’ as in character or competence. Anything else, including West Indies cricket, will be bulldozed. Because to them, `a nuh nutten’.