Dear Editor,
It was a former director of the WICB who told me years ago that what cricket in the Caribbean needed most was management by good business people. It troubled, but did not surprise me, because successful business people tend often to believe that good business skills are the solution to all problems, even including those associated with public office. The President of the WICB was, perhaps, the first person I heard volunteer the information publicly that his forte was finance. Whenever he talks about the successes of the WICB under his leadership the balance sheet of the organization gets pride of place. That the board narrowly escaped a claim for over 40 million US dollars against it, did not change his views about the effectiveness of his financial acumen.
One of the most significant aspects of that Indian fiasco was the President’s decision to offer India an alternative to the team that was considering not completing the tour. He obviously did not realize how seriously the Indians took their cricket, and that they would have known that the West Indies simply could not find fourteen West Indian replacement cricketers who would meet the demands of Indian fans for quality cricket. Indian journalists on tour to the West Indies have given me in their published articles important, relevant information on West Indian cricketers with which I was unfamiliar. It is not only financial expertise that is called for in the management of international cricket. In fact such expertise may not be among the most difficult skills to acquire in the region. The CEO hired by the board whose tenure was most recently ended, seems to have found it difficult to understand why dismissing head coaches on the eve of tours could have serious negative impact on the team’s performance. While a sound financial base and good financial management are crucial to the business of cricket, it may be a necessary but not a sufficient condition for successful management.
Success in international cricket requires good man management skills, and a great deal of preparation and long-term planning. The delay in dealing with the important preparatory steps needed for the upcoming tour by England is the kind of important issue we must become prepared to handle properly if we are to meet the challenges of twenty-first century international cricket.
Yours faithfully,
Romain Pitt
