Success Depends on Mental Sacrifice

The manner in which West Indies capitulated to England, within three and a half days, in the first test of their current test series is an affront to the intrinsic dignity of our proud people of the English speaking Caribbean. The somber faces of the West Indies supporters at Sabina, captured on camera at 11:55 AM on Sunday morning, said it all.

There is little doubt that West Indies cricket has hit rock bottom, for the better part of the last decade, consequentially there have been varied hypotheses advanced by a number of cricket aficionados to explain such an exasperating phenomenon.

A very astute observation, from no less a scholar of the game than Sir Everton Weeks, was published in the Weekend Nation in Barbados, January 2nd 2004. Sir Everton is quoted as saying that "The mental attitude [of our current crop of cricketers] needs to change." The fundamental premise of my hypothesis is in harmony with Sir Everton's observation.

Over the last 10 to 15 years, with the advent of rapidly evolving brain-imaging modalities (e.g. PET Scan, fMRI, etc.), it has been noted that the human brain, including the adult brain, has an almost infinite ability to change; this characteristic is referred to as "brain plasticity". However, such change is neigh impossible without the appropriate mental application on the part of the person or persons who are most likely to benefit from such change.

Let us for a moment review the neuro-physiology, as delineated by PET Scans and fMRIs, of the brain of a great sportsman (e.g. a great batsman). Such scanning modalities have proven that such an individual has an enormous array of cricket shots, stored in his frontal lobes, in the realm of his long-term memory. The process of storing such a vast repertoire of information takes a lot of time and requires considerable sacrifice on the part of the respective batsman. For anyone aiming for greatness, as a batsman in West Indies' cricket, there must be the insatiable desire to spend an inordinate amount of time batting under a vast array of conditions, against a spectrum of bowling styles.

I would like to emphasize that the simplified description I'm about to outline occurs in less than one second. At the moment that the ball leaves the bowler's hand Lara's eyes pick up the image of the ball, the image is transferred to his optic cortex (at the back of the brain), the optic cortex then sends a message to his frontal lobe (which assesses the ball for speed, length, width, bounce, swing, etc.), this is then compared to a number of stored images in his frontal lobe, a decision is then made by Lara as to what shot to select and a message is transferred to his motor cortex which then directs Lara's feet, arms and body how to move accordingly in order to execute his chosen shot. The ball is then played on its respective merit. For emphasis each of these steps involved in the decision making process takes less than a fraction of a second.

As a result of the rich memory store of such information in someone like Lara's long-term memory, when compared to the less experienced player, he has to spend less time thinking of which shot he is going to play to any given delivery. By extension the great and above average batsman always seems to have more time while playing his shots.

Of the current crop of contemporary West Indies batsmen, Brian Lara (a great batsman), seems to be the only one who is consistently comfortable against most types of bowling attacks in varied playing conditions.

Now the question that must follow is: Realistically can Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Chris Gayle, Dwayne Smith, Devon Smith, Ryan Hinds, Marlon Samuels, Wavell Hinds, Ricardo Powell, Aneil Kanhai, Narsingh Deonarine, Carlton Baugh, Brenton Parchment and company, with time, reach a level of consistency approaching Lara's?

The short answer is: Over the medium term it is possible. While I'm not suggesting that any of these youngsters is another Brian Lara waiting in the wings, considerable sacrifice and a deluge of perspiration, coupled with a modicum of inspiration, a significant number of the aforementioned can develop a truly trustworthy and reliable game.

Such a conclusion is not based on a "whim and a fancy" but is well-established in the discipline of neuroscience that is proving, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the brain's plasticity is no longer rooted in the empire of science-fiction but is firmly backed up with the auspices of evidence-based medicine.

PET Scan studies of geniuses and prodigies in varied sports reveal that, while at play, there is increased brain activity in areas that are important for the formation and storage of long-term memory. Some may postulate that the long-term memory capacity is absolutely limited by one's genetics. While it is not my intention to bore you with the specific details of the studies that have more or less debunked this fallacy, there are enough Class II scientific studies that have shown that a concerted individual effort can lead to an enhancement of the long-term memory capacity in anyone, without brain damage, who is willing to sacrifice the effort (Ericsson, Restak).

Ericsson, a world-renowned research oriented clinical psychologist from the University of Florida, Tallahassee, concluded that "intense solitary, deliberate practice among superior performing athletes" could ultimately enhance their sporting performance.

He went on to note, "For the superior performer the goal [simply] isn't just repeating the same thing again and again but achieving higher levels of control over every aspect of their performance [game]. That's why they don't find practice boring. Each practice session they [the player] are working on doing something better than they did the last time".

Note while Ericsson's words ring true for the "superior performer" the opposite tends to hold true for the less than "superior performer". In that studies have often shown that sub-optimal performers dedicate much less time to practice than their contemporaries that were outperforming them (i.e. the consistently sub-optimal performers do not seem to make as great a sacrifice).

Restak concluded, "In order to achieve superior performances the expert must counteract the natural impulse to gain an automated performance". In that the batsman must fight the impulse to repeatedly hang his bat outside of his off-stump or hooking the short bouncing ball, especially when it has lead to his recurrent dismissal in the past.

If the shot selection of our leading batsmen is going to improve they are going to have to live, eat and breathe cricket. Cricket must become a way of life. This was the case with our "old guard", for the likes of Sobers, Richards, Worrell, Walcott, Weeks, Kanhai, Greenidge, Lloyd, Haynes et al spent almost every waking moment playing or studying every aspect of their game. They seemed to live for nothing else. Additionally, they were prepared to listen to erudite words of advice and more so than anything else they knew what personal sacrifice was all about.

It may be worth the while for our West Indies batsmen to ponder the words of Sidney Howard, "One half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it."