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he would fabricate something like that ....obviously it is not going to sit well with Hoops being called a cry baby or Sir Viv a bully hence the denials which mek Lara look a scunt.....how many of yawl can remember which Windies captain blaze up to the press box to confront an English journalist cause he didn't like what was written about him an left the vice captain to lead out the team on the field ...yep was none other than I.V.A Richards so draw your own conclusions if was an ignaar aswell as a bully!!...btw the journalist was James Lawton who wrote for the Daily Express in England....google if in doubt!!

In reply to CCW
not to mention threatening to kill wasim akram the next time he sledged him and storming off in the nets to patrick patterson because he gave him trouble in the nets. i would love to have seen viv captain a team without greats and see how well he would manage

In reply to Jumpstart

Lara has a history of being ethical on the field and off the field. He went to great pains to make sure Viv was seen on good light. Had he not address the Viv situation in his book, it would have left more questions and speculation.

Viv should be happy that Lara sanitized his story, it could have been worse.

That Viv Richards was was terrible, especially to young players, is a well known unimpeachable fact.

Lara was kept back for 2 years and he remained a humble servant.

Viv never grew up, even in his old days: When Ramdin did the "talk nah Viv" it was reported Viv said something to the effect, "let him say it to my face."

The kind of antics a brash immature youth will say, not an older statesman who ought to have been fatherly to that immature comment from a young emotional Ramdin, a true elder statesman would have made light of it and immediately seek to kill the story.

In reply to CCW
Lara is talking di truth

Dat is all

In reply to Emir

viv in his second autobiography(i have a copy) used all kind of hyper-dotish excuses as to why he didn't pick lara, despite the manager, Wes Hall stating in 1991 that the WI middle order had been very weak for the last 5-6 years. As i stated earlier on this thread. Carl Hooper never got his average over 40, and viv only scored one hundred in his last three years as a test cricket, and that one against the second weakest attack in international cricket at the time, India. Keith Athurton scored his only two hundreds AFTER viv had retired. Note what BC Pires wrote for the UK Guardian

BC Pires


What many of these ex-players don't seem to realize that west indian societies are very small, and even if players don't say anything in public, they'll say it in private, and most West indians know someone who is close to the players.

Another thing, lara's temperament was given as a potential reason. But lara maintains close friendships with most of his teammates. Chris Gayle, who has publicly written about Lara's weaknesses as a captain(Gayle stated in his book that at points they just wanted Lara to talk to them) is close friends with lara. Lara himself admitted to those weaknesses in his book. Lara is very close friends with Ramnaresh Sarwan. Close friends with Walsh and Ambrose, even after Ambrose wrote that lara campaigned for the captaincy, which was true. And that is one thing about Ambrose's criticisms, they're always well thought out and very accurate. He's not a man who wastes words and that is why everyone in cricket respects him and I don't think anybody has a bad word to say about Walsh and Ambrose. They exude class on and off the field.

In reply to Jumpstart

I don't know what is in Lara's book, but I was listening to the coms in Oz when the Y was there, Hooper had lots of gr8 thing to say about Bri, and Lara was commenting for TV and he was waving off to Hooper. And this is what I heard live, no 2nd hand info.
Hooper even said he would had love to present the WI cap to Tagenarine, but the man Lara is here and it's better he did it.

In reply to CCW

In a court of law, both the alleged accused and victim take the stand and declare that the witness is giving false testimony. Case done, dat is all.

These matters have all kinds of shades of grey. They're not like the movies with good guys and bad guys. They are all about flawed humans like all of us with perspectives, biases, differing personalities and backgrounds etc.

All these guys have their issues...like all of us.

In reply to Cheeks

Exactly. We have some people here who want to paint Viv as the second coming of Malcolm X or Che Guevara. I freely admit Lara’s faults. He did handle the weight of being cricket’s first truly global superstar well and I think him and everyone around him in WI cricket were ill-prepared for the tidal wave of commercial interests that enveloped him after 501. He campaigned for the captaincy and quite probably underperformed in Pakistan to prove his point. He could be moody, opinionated etc.

In reply to tops

Lara has reserved the highest praise for Carl Hooper in his book. He hasn’t insulted him. Imagine Brian Lara writing that despite Carl Hooper averaging 36 in test cricket, he was more talented than himself and SRT. Lara could have focused on the fact that Hooper’s consistent mediocrity with the bat put him under much unnecessary pressure both as a batsman and captain. He didn’t.

In reply to Jumpstart

Well well said.

When we take a deep dive into WI cricket, the rot started during our period of invincibility (empires don't fall overnight, it take years- US is still the world's only supper-super power, but are now so week the fall is truly on- a good thing in my book)

The WICBC, the media, and players like Viv Richards did so much damage to WI cricket.

Viv did in fact keep out Lara for too long.

Viv should be kept very far from WI cricket- that individual is not good for our cricket.

What I don't understand is why anybody on here and the world will doubt Lara's pronouncements on Sir Viv.You only have to look at his antics on the field of play to notice his very tempestuos agression.I once saw him run towards an Umpire almost telling him the batsman was out,he eventually got the decision ,needless to say the batsman wasn't out when replayed.