Vice-president of Cricket West Indies Dr Kishore Shallow took the former administration to task for failing to give West Indies great Shivnarine Chanderpaul a fitting send-off.
Dr. Shallow made the remarks during his feature address at the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) annual awards ceremony on Wednesday evening at the Georgetown Cricket Club (GCC) pavilion.
The Guyanese, in 2015 was surprisingly left out of the West Indies test squad for the home series against Australia following a dodgy outing against England in May of that year.
Though his form had dipped, many pundits felt that the then 40-year-old servant of West Indies cricket should have been given the opportunity to call time on his career instead of being unceremoniously pushed out.
The Dave Cameron led board, Dr. Shallow argued, could have also used the opportunity to gift Chanderpaul a hero’s send off. He was 45 runs shy of becoming the leading West Indies test run-scorer.
Shallow, in that regard contended that Chanderpaul who was widely touted as “Tiger” should have gone out on his own terms.
“There is now a drive for us to be a player centric organisation (CWI); meaning putting our players first… that may not be as obvious as it sounds but it’s something that we need to continue to echo, that players need to be central when we continue advancing our cricket,” Shallow the youngest CWI VP explained.
He used Chanderpaul’s snubbing to illustrate how not to manage players, let alone legends of the game.
“So, no more would a legend like Shivnarine Chanderpaul be pushed out the game without due recognition and that is what we mean when we say player centric organisation… and let me use this opportunity to apologise to Shiv Chanderpaul and I know the president would certainly endorse this. Let me apologise for the way or the failing of our past administrators and selectors for not awarding Shiv the privilege of moving on his own terms. Also, I want to publicly thank him for his contributions to West Indies cricket,” the entrepreneur divulged.
The Guyanese, who reached the apex of the International Cricket Council (ICC) test batting charts on a number of occasions, made his international debut in 1994 as a 19-year-old. He went to graft a 21-year career, becoming a cult figure owing to his unorthodox batting stance. After 164 test matches he compiled 11, 867 runs inclusive of 30 centuries at an average of over 50. Chanderpaul’s career in context was prematurely ended being the second highest West Indies test runs scorer, 45 runs behind Brian Lara. The Guyanese also amassed 8778 one day international runs from 268 appearances.
