Hooper: 'I Haven't Retired'

Wed, May 7, '03

Former West Indies captain Carl Hooper has left the door open for a return to the Caribbean side, insisting he has not retired from international cricket.

"I haven't retired, I want to play cricket, whether it's at the Test level, First-class level, playing for Guyana, it doesn't really matter, I just want to play some cricket," the Guyanese all-rounder said on the eve of his return to English County cricket for Lancashire

Hooper, who has signed a temporary contract to serve as Harbajan Singh's replacement for Lancashire, told a Barbados television crew he was "desperate" to get back to competitive cricket. "Right now I just want to play some cricket, I haven't played for just about a month now, and I'm desperate to get back."

"I am excited about going to play some cricket and I hope things go well," said Hooper, who will spend five weeks at Lancashire, once the home of fellow Guyanese Clive Lloyd.

It will be the second go-around for Hooper on the County circuit, who enjoyed several successful seasons as an off-spinning all-rounder for Kent.

It is strange that Hooper is insisting he still has the desire to play Test cricket, having withdrawn from the West Indies side at the last minute because of the "new direction in which the team will now head". At the time, Hooper said he did not want to rob a younger player of a place in the side but, at the age of 36, any return to the side would effectively mean a younger player would be dropped.

There have been reports that Hooper felt "backstabbed" by Brian Lara, who replaced him as captain and had vowed never to play under the Trinidadian.

In 102 Tests for the West Indies between 1987 and 2002, Hooper scored 5,762 runs (avg. 36.46). He also appeared in 227 ODIs for the regional side.