(Jamaica Observer) One of West Indies cricket’s all-time stars, Sir Vivian Richards, admires present Windies captain Darren Sammy and coach Ottis Gibson, but he has a few words for both men: Get your individual acts together.
Sir Viv insists that both men have key roles to play in moving West Indies cricket forward, but the former captain who was in Jamaica last week to promote Johnnie Walker Scotch Whisky’s ‘Responsible Drinking’ programme, believes that individual performances by them can determine how well others perform.
Of Sammy, who has been under pressure both for lifting his all-round game and getting winning results as captain, Sir Viv, a veteran of 121 Tests and 187 One-Day Internationals for the West Indies that he also captained with success, is cautiously optimistic he can improve his performances and inspire the team.
“When Sammy was given the job I was pretty impressed with his blueprint on the way forward. Even though we have him as one of our better thinking captains, there are things apart from the thinking side which he also should know must be done,” Sir Viv said in an interview with the Sunday Observer.
“The comments and topics in the region is about whether or not Sammy can make the team without having to be in the capacity as captain. He hasn’t quite come to the party with his performance, because when you look at other captains around the world, they would have helped out performance-wise on the field.
“We have to remember now that we’re not involved in Ryder Cup golf, or the President’s Cup or Davis Cup tennis where you have your non-playing captain. He should recognise the situation that he is in now with the rEsponsibility of being captain, knowing that a captain needs to perform to encourage the other individuals who are in your team.
“If he can start start inspiring his players, we are gonna start winning. You cannot continue losing and make a contribution on the mental side of things. You must have the performance that matches what you say. There are gonna be situations where you are going to say to a guy, ‘hey, I want to see you do this or do that and you should be doing this.’
“Sometimes some guys can be very cocky and especially if you are the captain and go out there and don’t get anything, you cannot approach some guys and tell them anything… you haven’t got the power to tell a guy to buck his act up. He would then say, ‘then what about you skip.’ There are some cocky boys like that,” Sir Viv said, adding that Sammy’s game was now at a crossroads.
“In order to eliminate that, I believe that Sammy is at a stage now… at the crosswords of how long he can continue in this particular mode, with the concerns of Caribbean folks, and if the team is losing and he is not making a contribution with bat and ball.
“He has to start somewhere to warrant why he is at the helm of the West Indies team,” Sir Viv said of the St Lucian.
Turning to Gibson, Sir Viv said the Barbadian former Windies fastbowling all-rounder should be given a chance to get his coaching job on the road, but urged him to stay away from making unwarranted comments about players and try to share some responsibilities with manager Richie Richardson.
“I’m not sure whether Gibson is the right man (as coach). Every individual who comes into the job should be given an opportunity, a one year or two years in never really enough. Someone with a two-year contract can’t get much done. Sometimes it takes two years to sort out the good from the bad and determine where you would like to go,” Sir Viv said, citing deficiencies in Gibson’s performance in the World Cup in India earlier this year.
Sir Viv was also in India working during the tournament.
“I wasn’t impressed when I was in India. I was making a comparison in India; you never heard of a Gary Kirsten (former coach of India), yet you saw the performance. Coaches should be seen to be getting results and the less you hear from them, the better.
“I’d like to know if the roles have changed, because having someone like Richie Richardson who played under myself and Clive Lloyd as captains, there as manager when he was making all these comments, I found it strange.”
Sir Viv was referring to negative comments made by Gibson about senior players Chris Gayle and Shivnarine Chanderpaul in particular, with the players firing back with claims of their own about him.
“Ottis Gibson was only the bowling coach of England… the fast bowling coach of England, so when he was given this job, I felt that he would certainly need some help. I see Desmond Haynes has filled the capacity as batting coach and that to me is a good move, but when you look at some of the stuff that went on in India, I felt that we missed out on some of the powerplays, like which time you should use a man and when you shouldn’t. I felt that he missed out a lot on some of the strategies.
“So there’s lots of help needed. We should give him time to let the contract run and if he cannot get it done, then we take action.
“We have heard a lot of stuff and I don’t think it’s good to be washing our linen in public. It looks to me like they are trying to get rid of the guys who are highly paid and put a fresh crew of blokes in who you can give anything that you like. I hope that’s not the case,” Sir Viv said.
