WICB bark louder than its bite

Maybe I did not devote enough time to listening carefully to the recent interviews with the two occupiers of the hot seats in the WICB boardroom.

To my mind, there is absolutely no good reason why the ICC should even entertain the thought of dividing the handful of cricketing countries for any reason.

I can only assume that the quality of our cricket has reached a level where we are no longer the crowd pullers we were in previous years.

Whenever the chairman of the WICB could accept the fact that the board will make money from the recent proposal of the ICC, my question to the gentleman will be: “How will an increase in our bank account uplift the abysmal state of game itself?”

Is money the be all and end all for the game’s survival? Are we so far away from the sport that holds our interest that we cannot see the rapid decay of its quality by the poor performances of the players themselves ?

Messrs Cameron and the current director Mr Pybus have so far proven to be unable to present a picture which spells progress.

We have often heard of these grandiose plans from one leader to another, which always appear to be superficial chatter, without even the slightest methodology leading to a better cricket programme.

My deep feeling is that the structure of West Indies cricket is fragile in every way, with the sources of adequate sports management and technical development literally deficient.

If this assessment has the level of accuracy which I believe is evident, then the stakeholders coming from the different affiliated countries, must act in the interest of an improved state of the game, even if they have to withdraw their own failed ideas, and replace themselves with professional practitioners whose expertise will contribute to a better quality, a more organised form of cricket education to the glut of potentially talented cricketers.

At this point in time, we are fully aware of the available talent and the guidance which they need to turn their potential into stardom, a process which we have been able to witness through the group of superstars who took us to the top over the past few decades.

We have no bargaining power which would sound convincing to the ICC. Our players are not well attuned to the professional approach which beings success.

Our bark is louder than our bite and no amount of conciliatory comments from the patriots have been known to bring an improved state of our cricket.

Maybe the most intelligent advice to the WICB came from the famous Barbadian sports psychologist Dr Rudy Webster, whose reputation is well known by numerous former cricketers the world over.

His expression of the value of education for our cricketers, specially through the utilisation of high quality coaches on a long term basis, may well be the most appropriate route to a better standard of our cricket.

It may even be a great idea to include him within the technical staff in a way that he had done over the years.

We are now certain that money did not help us to be better cricketers. 

The players are well paid, but our results have not been close to what the former players achieved and for less money.

Maybe the definition of the professional has a certain degree of ambiguity.

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