Tony Cozier

As impressively composed off the field as on it, Daren Ganga has made a few significant and obviously deliberate points as his amazing Trinidad and Tobago team has overcome one supposedly superior opponent after another on their way to the semi-finals of the high profile Champions League trophytournament in India.

By Tony Cozier Whether or not Chris Gayle is restored as captain when all the players are again available is looming as the most contentious issue between the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and the West Indies Players Association (WIPA) prior to the forthcoming tour of Australia.

Under whatever dispensation, and there have been numerous, the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) has never appeared to grasp what should be the structure or the purpose of its annual one-day tournament.

Ernest Hilaire would have been better advised not to get involved in such issues even before taking up his sensitive position as the latest chief executive of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) but his stated doubts last week over Chris Gayle’s reappointment as captain, should he and the striking players be eligible for the forthcoming tour of Australia, were well founded.

However much it must rankle them to give even an inch to the striking players whose selfishness has caused such embarrassment and distress to West Indies cricket, Friday’s events in the sleepy South African university town of Potchchefstroom provided further certain evidence for the hard-liners within the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) that the present situation cannot be allowed to continue.

-says Steven Camacho No advertisements have been posted and no prospective candidates have yet been approached to fill the vacant post of West Indies’ head coach, Steve Camacho, acting chief executive of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB), said yesterday.

-WI U-19 team to take part Trinidad and Tobago are scheduled to start the defence of their regional cricket one-day title just three days after the final of the inaugural Champions League in India in which they are one of 12 participating teams.

A rigorous preparation programme is planned over the next three weeks for the weakened, inexperienced West Indies team to the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy in South Africa.

For the past two weeks, the entire Caribbean has been rejoicing as one at the exploits of the phenomenal Usain Bolt, of golden boy Ryan Brathwaite, of the glittering girls in gold, black and green and of a host of others competing at the world track and field championships in Berlin under the multiple flags of the region, but all unmistakably West Indian.

– WICB excludes players who made themselves unavailable for Bangaldesh Series from Champions Trophy team In a move guaranteed to undermine the ongoing mediation process between itself and the West Indies Players Association (WIPA) as well as devalue the standard of the tournament, the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) yesterday excluded all those players who made themselves unavailable for the recent series against Bangladesh in their team for next month’s ICC Champions’ Trophy in South Africa.

When he came to his review of relationships with the West Indies Players Association (WIPA) in his second annual report as unchallenged president of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) last week, Dr Julian Hunte was in bullish mood.

John Dyson was sacked yesterday from the most hopeless job in international cricket.

West Indies cricket has been thrown into further disarray by the decision of the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB) to stay away from the annual general meeting of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) in Antigua today and tomorrow.

The talk of the break up of West Indies cricket into its constituent parts or, conversely, its demotion to the second division of a proposed new Test match league, grows louder by the day.

HERE was a distinct sense of de ja vu to the front page picture in Tuesday’s DAILY NATION, as there has been throughout the newest, unseemly quarrel between the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and the West Indies Players Association (WIPA).

Australia, New Zealand and Zimbabwe have all gone through disagreements between board and players that have led to strikes and threatened strikes and that, once again, have shaken West Indies cricket to its core.

For the second successive ODI, the West Indies found themselves chasing an overwhelming total – and losing – in the first of the four-match series against India at Sabina Park on Friday.

There  was a certain and satisfying sense of déjà vu for the West Indies at the Oval on Monday night.

It has taken the simultaneous, belated arrival of summer and of Dwayne Bravo and the change to the game’s shortest, newest and most popular format to shake the West Indies out of the embarrassing lethargy that previously typified their cricket in the two Tests and two ODIs in which they were thrashed by England.

Cricket’s continuing evolution According to Allen Stanford, Chris Gayle and a host of others, it is the game of the future but cricket’s newest and shortest format, the Twenty20, had proved itself very much the game of the present well before its second World Championship that started so sensationally at Lord’s on Friday and the Oval yesterday.