Director of Cricket at Cricket West Indies, Jimmy Adams, has outlined four areas where players may be exempted from the minimum fitness standard.
Adams, was at the time speaking on Barbados’ radio programme, Mason and Guest where he sought to clarify some aspects of the selection criteria in light of a barrage of criticism of the West Indies T20 World Cup squad.
“There is a minimum standard for selection into the teams, barring an exception,” Adams reiterated.
He indicated that this standard is based on a minimum of 40 on the intermittent yo-yo test.
“The contracted players over and above that, will have individual targets they would have to make at twice yearly testing as time goes on.
“The contracted players however, have individual standards that we push over and above that minimum standard so it’s a combination of both. There is a minimum standard for selection but once you become a contracted player, the individual player has targets that they have to attain over a period of time…,” he said.
On the other hand, there are other situations where players have different targets to meet.
“There will be four reasons why exceptions will be granted, one is age, one is training history, one is injury history and one has to do with physiological issues and in any one of those four areas exceptions might be granted to players.”
At the time when the World Cup squad was announced last month, Guyanese all-rounder, Sherfane Rutherford, Jamaican all-rounder Odean Smith and Trinidad off-spinner, Sunil Narine, were omitted based on them failing to meet the fitness standards, according to Chairman of Selectors, Roger Harper.
With the tests being conducted bi-annually, Adams pointed out that results from other leagues or franchises could be used.
“Once the test is signed off by the medical people at CWI and I hope the results are communicated to CWI then I don’t think it would be a problem.”
