It must be the money
St Maarten’s idyllic touristy setting seems a world away from the never-ending drama that is West Indies cricket, which probably explains why the West Indies Cricket Board chose to host the final directors’ meeting of the year there at the weekend.
So many of the organisation’s decisions and policy positions appear completely out of touch with reality, like their stated intention to “continue the discussions about release fees for West Indies players who ply their trade in Twenty20 leagues across the world” at the meeting, even though they behaved as if a decision had not only been made, but was agreed to by other Full Member nations when attempting last month to squeeze out a 20 per cent fee from Kieron Pollard’s employers before he participated in the Ram Slam event in South Africa.
Completely contrary responses from officials in South Africa and Australia (they said the matter was raised by the West Indies at International Cricket Council level but never got beyond a preliminary dialogue) left the impression that the WICB were trying a thing, hardly surprising given the administration’s well-established track record of bewildering behaviour.