By Orin Davidson
If we haven’t seen it all before, the West Indies Cricket Board is continuing to prove why it remains the joke of world cricket administration.
In the aftermath of the Phil Simmons fiasco, the Board added another layer to its laundry list of transgressions as double standards can now be added to the raft of ignominious acts, of its mismanagement of Regional cricket.
New team coach Simmons was promptly banned for Sri Lanka tour for his ill-advised public criticism of three team selectors. And It took the Board less than two days to lay the hammer on the former Test batsman for his outburst to the media, when he accused three selectors of being WICB puppets. Yet almost a year later, the Board has failed to announce disciplinary action taken against any of its administrators whose ineptitude triggered the walkout by the team from its India tour last year.
Despite the resultant US $41 million price tag hanging around its neck—- owed to the Board For Cricket Control of India (BCCI), as a result of the players’ walkout, the WICB has refused to make Chief Executive Officer Michael Muirhead or any of his underlings, who shockingly sent the team off to the sub- continent minus contracts, pay for the damage.
Surely, Dwayne Bravo, the then One Day International (ODI) captain and others who spearheaded the wages disagreement influenced boycott, deserve some form of sanction. But after one year it seems they have been banned permanently from all teams except the T20 squad.
Clearly, this Board has one set of rules for its teams and seemingly none for its administrators.
It has a marketing department that has been clueless in attracting sponsorship for competitions and promoting its events, yet you never hear of changes made. The Board’s bloated administrative staff is replete with a number of useless positions that continue to bleed money it does not have, and you never hear of adjustments.
Instead, the most important component of West Indies cricket, its teams and support staff dare not step out of line. Presently the offending players do not know if they will ever don white uniforms or the ODI types with maroon caps, even though the Commission of Inquiry concluded that both parties—-the Board and players were culpable in the India debacle.
Whycliffe “Dave” Cameron, the WICB President at whose feet the blame should be eventually attributed, contemptuously stood his ground in the position, then rallied his conspirators on the Board to win the subsequent elections, instead of excusing himself and resigning in shame.
Given the weak response by stakeholders to Cameron’s victory, the man clearly feels impregnable and his Board has suddenly become this august body of such high standards, not even a smidgen of criticism is tolerated. Of course the extreme opposite has been the case for as long as the memory can stretch.
So Simmons has felt the wrath of Cameron and his cronies on the Board for even hinting that Courtney Walsh, Eldine Baptiste and Courtney Brown, were influenced by WICB members to vote against the selection of Bravo and Pollard for the One-Day International series in Sri Lanka.
It is important to note that the Trinidad and Tobago Board representative, its President Azim Bassarath has stated his ignorance of any decision to pull Simmons from the tour, adding more fuel to speculation it was one that came solely from the top.
Under normal professional circumstances, Simmons should’ve been fined and allowed to get on with his goal of making the team better, in the extreme challenging Asian conditions.
He didn’t identify any person by name in his outburst, but as usual the WICB with its convoluted style of management slapped the coach with a penalty without first thinking clearly about acting.
In the press release, the Board stated that Simmons has been suspended pending an investigation which is as unconventional as it is out of place in the world of sports.
Running a sports team is not synonymous with the management of a regular business where employees in all capacities have lifetime careers and can be had at a dime a dozen, in which companies or governments can afford the time for suspensions and investigations for even minor issues. Or in a case of waiting ages for applications and long winded interviewing processes to fill positions.
In sports it’s all about winning games and matches instantly, dependent on aggressively acquiring sportspeople with scarce talents where teams and individuals successes are often measured by their latest win and whose careers can be end in the blink of an eye.
These days West Indies cricket decision makers are individuals with little or no background in the sport, who think they are running political establishments and often act with minuscule regard to merited cricket norms. Bartering by officials for favors is the WICB’s motto, made worse by the diverse makeup of the regional game, comprising more than a dozen small countries of varied cultures and mentalities.
Chief Executive Officers and others come loaded with University degrees who have no clue in managing cricket operations. The upshot is the ruin of West Indies cricket from a region rich with talented players whose teams once dominated the world for 15 years, but are now among the worst in the last 20.
Even if Simmons’ wages wouldn’t be affected by his removal from the Sri Lanka tour, he has already been penalized by any standard in international sports.
He will miss seven matches in an entire tour which in itself is a steep penalty.
American football player Tom Brady, recently went as far as the High Court to have a four-match ban imposed by the Sports’ Commissioner, rescinded.
And the WI coach could suffer more after this seemingly high profile inquiry is finished. All this fuss created by the Board is making it seem Simmons committed the crime of the century. They talk of him breaching its code of confidentiality, but how about this Board instituting a code of competence for all its officials. By any such standard Cameron, Moorhead and others would be history by now. Of late the former has been going around the Region holding Town Hall meetings, for which purpose only Cameron himself knows. If he wants suggestions for improving his Board, he has the Patterson and Wilkins Reports gathering dust from years of non-use in its Antigua office.
So, for this important Sri Lanka tour, Baptiste, the ex-all-rounder, Stanford Super Stars and Natal team coach in South Africa, has been abruptly handed the poisoned chalice to whip this team of unheralded players into winning form in a country where more than half has never visited, much less played.
In actuality, Baptiste should’ve been given this opportunity many moons ago given his outstanding work with the Stanford Supers and success with Natal.
So far Simmons has been a disappointment as his philosophy has been found wanting in his six-month stint.
His failure to recognize Shivnarine Chanderpaul’s importance in the Test team as a mentor to the plethora of greenhorn players, even if the player’s batting declined in two series, as well as his belief that Pollard should be considered for Tests, exposed a weakness coaches should resist.
Baptiste, hopefully, would display better judgment for now.
It is an acid test.
