Last Sunday really ought to have seen a triumphant celebration across the entire Caribbean following the West Indies’ record-breaking run-chase (236 for 6 in 19.2 overs) to defeat a shell-shocked South Africa who must surely have thought that the batting feats of Faf du Plessis and company had taken the game beyond the West Indies. The win on Sunday, the record-breaking feat and the T/20 series victory would probably have come against the expectations of many Caribbean cricket lovers who would have felt that the team might find it impossible to pick themselves up after being thoroughly outplayed by South Africa in the three-match Test series.
If there would certainly have been a celebration of sorts at the team level after last Sunday’s exertions, Chris Gayle, who, by his personal exploits in the two T/20 games played so far served a timely reminder to the cricketing world that for sheer destructive power hitting he is still ‘the man,’ so to speak, used his man-of-the-match platform to speak his mind on the issue of the exclusion of Dwayne Bravo and Keiron Pollard from the Caribbean 15-man squad for the forthcoming Cricket World Cup scheduled to take place in Australia and New Zealand from February 14 to March 28.
Gayle (whose return to form for the West Indies has buoyed spirits among Caribbean cricket lovers) used his own high profile as one of the top players in the world in the shorter forms of the game to make clear his view that the exclusion of Bravo and Pollard from the West Indies squad was a bad thing for regional cricket. Gayle’s was not a delicate passing comment. It was a blunt and direct pronouncement that pilloried the WIBC and the selectors and appeared to place his own views on the matter of the omission of Bravo and Pollard at variance with those of the Chairman of the panel of selectors, Clive Lloyd. Nor can we be sure that Gayle’s sentiments, pointed and poignant as they were, are not shared by other members of the team.
The question now surely arises as to whether Gayle’s undiplomatic outburst it not likely to trigger further energetic furors in the region over the exclusion of two of the West Indies’ top players from the team for cricket’s single most prestigious tournament.
If it is to be noted that Clive Lloyd has been singing the praises of the squad selected for the World Cup, the fact that Gayle – whose profile in contemporary Caribbean cricket affords him a measure of recognition which, arguably, is every inch the equal of Lloyd’s – has strong views on the exclusion of Bravo and Pollard from the team and chose to make those views public in a decidedly unambiguous way, is not a matter to be taken lightly. Indeed, it sends discomfitting signals and raises the question as to just how much this issue might affect the team’s morale and, by extension, its performance, in Australia and New Zealand. In this context it ought not to be forgotten that the new Captain, Jason Holder, is young and inexperienced and could struggle to cope with any internal disruptive developments that might occur inside the West Indies team during the World Cup.
It is of course hardly necessary to retrace the steps that led to the eventuality of the exclusion of Bravo and Pollard, except to say that if the actions that caused the ill-fated tour of India to be truncated were considered by some to be a delinquent act, as many if not greater numbers felt that it was the actions of the WICB that triggered the abandonment of the tour in the first place.
Time and again, regional students of the game including cricketers and politicians – the latest in the latter category being Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves of St Vincent and the Grenadines – have commented on what is seen as the propensity of the WICB to go around ‘playing God,’ treating cricketers – the people who make the game – with scant regard and playing games with important issues like players’ contracts. It is the sort of behaviour that we have come to associate with many of our regional politicians who, not infrequently, speak and act as though their respective jurisdictions are fiefdoms and they are their undisputed rulers.
The current brouhaha that led to the exclusion of Bravo and Pollard from the squad for Australia and New Zealand comes at a time when regional cricket is in a condition of decline and when the exclusion of players from a team over an issue which, surely, can be settled around a table, is not a luxury that we can afford. The Board can insist to the contrary till the cows come home. The fact of the matter is that it makes no sense whatsoever to allow Bravo and Pollard to play with the T/20 team in South Africa then leave them out for the 50-over side for the same tour and after that from the World Cup. It is an absurdity that all of us in the region ought to find altogether unacceptable.
With Bravo and Pollard included in the World Cup squad the West Indies would have had as good a pound-for- pound team as any. In their absence the squad, despite evidence of a fair measure of both talent and experience, is decidedly weaker. Bravo and Pollard have proven themselves to be top-class performers in limited overs cricket. At a time when our cricket is so badly in need of a shot in the arm, this is hardly the time to leave out two key players.
There is, of course, an entirely understandable argument for keeping the game free of political intervention. On the other hand it has to be said that this particular circumstance may well warrant an assertive enquiry from Caricom heads as to whether the exclusion of Bravo and Pollard from the World Cup team is really in the interest of West Indies cricket at this time. More than that, one might well ask whether the timing might not be right for the real owners of our cricket, the people of the region, to issue a timely reminder to the WICB that there are times – like this one – when we are far from comfortable with the decisions that they make. If we – Caricom and Caribbean people together – do not at least make a robust effort to have the decision to exclude Bravo and Pollard from the World Cup squad overturned, then we must be prepared to accept at least some of the responsibility for any deficiencies in the team’s performance that might prevent us from doing the best that we are capable of in the World Cup.
