The fact that the national cricket team was vanquished inside of three days by defending champions Barbados at home in the second round of the West Indies Cricket Board’s regional four day encounter might for some be inconsequential, trivial, no big thing for, after all, this is Guyana and such things often do not merit a second thought, or, are soon forgotten.
However, when one considers that this is the national team’s second outright defeat in the tournament, compounded by the manner in which they succumbed in their own backyard, by the huge margin of 136 runs, at least those in charge of the nation’s cricket should be concerned for after all cricket is still the national sport.
At the start of this regional four day tournament, expectations were high. Leon Johnson was named skipper of the team with the iconic figure of test veteran Shiv Chanderpaul as his deputy, there to look over and guide the young cappo.
But Johnson was bowled out of the first two rounds of the tournament through injury and Chanderpaul and fellow test player Ramnaresh Sarwan followed suit, again, injury being the bugbear.
The three strikes seemed to put the Guyanese out of it.
The loss of Chanderpaul and Sarwan in Jamaica affected the team’s confidence so much that they were routed for 117 by the Jamaicans after being sent in.
They batted much better the second time around and even took the Jamaicans into the fourth day though they were beaten outright by the Jamaicans.
For the second round encounter, the team, still without the injured trio, was expected to play much better having the benefit of home court advantage. It did’nt. In fact, the team played much worse losing to Barbados inside of three days.
After dismissing the defending champs for 184 in their first innings one could easily have been forgiven for being optimistic, thinking that first innings points was in the bag especially since openers Sewnarine Chattergoon and Tagenarine `Young Tiger’ Chanderpaul scored 91 runs between them.
However, like they did against Jamaica, the Guyanese batsmen flattered to deceive and the team was dismissed by the Bajans for 140. Not to be outdone the bowlers fought gamely and dismissed the Bajans for 186 in their second innings.
At that stage fans were licking their chops in anticipation of a come-from-behind-win with Guyana having a day and a little over two sessions to make the runs.
What followed was unexepected and anticlimactic.
In 42.3 overs it was all over and the Bajans were celebrating on hallowed ground, the National Stadium at Providence.
What is particularly galling is that the batsmen undid all the hard work of the bowlers by throwing their wickets away in reckless fashion so much so that the team was dismissed for 94 runs in less than two full sessions.
Where does the team go from here?
Further downhill would be a good guess.
For a country which has produced great batsmen, the likes of Rohan Kanhai, Clive Lloyd, Alvin Kallicharran, Roy Fredericks, Basil Butcher and last but by no means least Shivnarine Chanderpaul, the peformances of some of the specialist batsmen in the national team is nothing but abominable.
The pitch might have had something to do with it for after all Barbados failed to reach 200 in either innings. Also the day/night encounter and playing with a pink ball might all have been contributory factors but if the truth be told, Guyana’s demise resulted from nothing else but a lack of application by the batsmen and poor shot selection.
But it is not only the Guyana board that must be concerned the WICB should too.
The amount of sub 200 totals, the amount of matches that do not least four days, the frequent collapses by teams when batting all point to a sub standard quality of cricket that needs to be addressed and quickly.
Years ago it was not uncommon to find two batsmen batting out an entire sessior or two. Nowadays, an entire team can be bowled out in one or two sessions.
The Guyana Cricket Board should not wait until the tournament concludes to try and get to the bottom of the team’s poor performances so far.
As the governing body with responsibility for cricket it is up to them to make the necessary adjustments.
But given the way cricket is run in Guyana with no end in sight to the impasse, (which might be the underlying cause of all this) such performances by the national senior team might are bound to continue, whether the ball is pink, red or blue or the pitches slow or low.
