Flat Tracks Hold Us Back

Despite the recent controversy surrounding the Sabina wicket, it is usually the sort of pitch that is good for cricket, offering bounce and movement early on, followed by a docile period, and finally crumbling into a good spinning wicket. A team with a balanced attack and batsmen with good technique who are willing to apply themselves should expect to win matches there, and that is what happened last weekend.

For all of Brian Lara's discontent with his lack of a spinner for Sabina -- and that is certainly a valid complaint given the seven year history of this square -- the fact remains that it was not the bowling but rather the batting that let the West Indies down. After bowling India out for 200 runs, the batsmen gave the game away by allowing themselves to be dismissed for a paltry 103 runs on a track that was challenging but never impossible.

Granted, losing the better part of Ramnaresh Sarwan's bat was a big blow to that cause, but having seen the nature of the pitch for a full day beforehand, and especially after losing Chris Gayle for nought, the approach adopted by the batsmen in the first innings was foolhardy at best.

With the exception of Daren Ganga, none of the batsmen were willing to apply themselves, and Lara's huge cowlash across the line shortly before being dismissed by a lifter was evidence of that. The West Indies lost the match in their first innings when they failed to make the most of the best batting conditions the match would see.

In stark contrast, the Indian captain Rahul Dravid, and also Denesh Ramdin in the second innings, showed that concentration and application could bring runs, and the margin of defeat could easily have been made up by even one batsman putting his head down and occupying the crease for another two hours. The fact that the West Indian batsmen managed to pass 200 batting last against both Kumble and Harbhajan Singh stands as further evidence that the missing 50 runs were well within their grasp in the first innings, and India should never have been allowed to take a 100 run lead.

Moving forward from this series, we are faced with the realization that our bowlers can only take wickets on lively pitches, and our batsmen can only make runs on dead ones. In order to be successful at Test cricket, this team will need to learn how to bat and bowl when the conditions do not suit them. While this is the domain of head coach Bennett King, who has yet to show us any marked improvement in his charges, the root of the problem is the state of the wickets used in first class cricket in the region.

Steve Waugh stated back in '03 that until the West Indies stopped producing dead wickets they would struggle to produce quality pacemen again. Three years later his words ring true, and there are no obvious heirs to the West Indian fast bowling legacy last represented by Walsh and Ambrose. There or thereabouts medium pacers and fast, flat 'spinners' dominate the regional competitions and the first class teams see more value in bits and pieces players than outright bowlers. Not only does the art of fast bowling suffer, but the more subtle art of spin gets little reward on most of the strips prepared around the region.

Similarly, batmen cannot develop their skills on flat tracks against bowlers who are given, rather than who take, their wickets. We see time and again regional batsmen making big scores in domestic competitions only to struggle against international attacks. One wonders if Chris Gayle wouldn't have developed a more solid technique if he had been forced to score his early domestic runs against deliveries that moved in the air and bounced sharply upon pitching. Gayle is not alone, he is only the best known proponent of the stand-and-deliver approach to batting that has become common among West Indian first class batsmen.

The heady days of the four prong pace attack are long gone, not only because 'prongs' can only pierce if they are sharp, but also because the game has changed. Captains have to provide the spectators with a minimum number of overs in a day, and bowlers are limited in how they can deploy the short ball. Instead of trying to revive a dead tradition, the West Indies need to focus on developing a new tradition, one that involves bowling attacks that can take 20 wickets in any conditions.

First class cricket must lead the way, and to do this regional cricket must have an incentive for developing the kinds of bowlers who can dismiss good batsmen, and the kinds of batsmen who can score runs against them. Proper first class pitches are a major key to this development, and if West Indies cricket is to survive and prosper, more wickets like those at Sabina Park and Queens Park Oval need to be prepared and made available for regional matches.