C Martin-Jenkins: West Indies confident of resuscitating ailing game (19 Mar 1998)

19 March 1998

West Indies confident of resuscitating ailing game

Christopher Martin-Jenkins

THE mood of West Indian cricket is uncertain as their 'national' team prepare for the final Test tomorrow. Full houses at another ground which has been enlarged, its outfield returfed and its square relaid, are guaranteed by the large tourist presence from England. But there is an uneasy feeling among West Indians who know their cricket that a 2-1 lead is an unfair reflection of the series so far.

Below the level of the national side much still needs to be done to halt a relative decline. It is not difficult to say what is wrong with the game in the Caribbean at present: the West Indian side have made no genuine forward movement since the heavy defeat in Pakistan this winter and the scanty reserve strength, especially in batting, was underlined by the beaten A team in South Africa.

In a region with a small population and limited business activity, there is too little money for the West Indies Board to deal with the problems quickly. The one-day domestic tournament was held in only one country, Jamaica, to suit the only available sponsor, and no sponsor could be found for this year's four-day tournament. Pitches and the art of groundsmanship have been in decline.

There has been laudable investment on the major Test grounds but everywhere England have been so far, except, ironically, Sabina Park, building refurbishments have been left until too late for proper completion. Meanwhile, the insidious influence of American sport, constantly beamed to the Caribbean on satellite television, continues to undermine the one sport common to all West Indians, the one in which they dominated the world for 15 years.

There is, however, another side to this gloomy story. For a start the current series has been genuinely profitable, partly because it has been so enthralling from the first brutal lifter and bizarre shooter at the outset of the rapidly-abandoned Sabina Park Test to the fluctuating drama of the fifth Test in Bridgetown.

Thanks to the continued sponsorship of Cable and Wireless, the television contract with TWI and the gate receipts for the four Tests since the fiasco in Kingston, the profits will more than wipe out the operating loss of US$267,038 recorded by the West Indies Board last year.

Their vice-president, Julian Hunte, is deputy to Jamaican Pat Rousseau and more experienced than anyone on a board which was reshaped two years ago, putting less faith in old players and more in a businesslike approach with new marketing and public relations support. As chairman of the development committee, Hunte, 58, believes that newly-promised financial support from Caricom, the regional political organisation, will help towards a rapid reconstruction effort.

"We have budgets to spend on cricket itself, grounds, pitches, umpires and what we call human resources - in other words preparing players from the age of 15 upwards for a life in cricket on and off the field. We have coaching programmes starting in the schools in all the cricketing islands.

"We have to coach the coaches to begin to address the relative decline of cricket below the age of 15. By 2000 we hope to have 200 professional coaches working full-time. In the past the game used to look after itself and county cricket helped to polish some of our better players. We see the need now for a proper infrastructure throughout the Caribbean, with the board co-ordinating the whole effort, not leaving it to individual islands."

Reg Scarlett, the ex-Jamaica and West Indies off-spinner who made his name as a coach among West Indian youth in London, was appointed as the board's director of coaching last May. Malcolm Marshall deals with the squad of 30 players who are retained by the board, with the help of Caricom. Roger Harper coaches the A team and Gus Logie co-ordinates the youth teams. The West Indies have been slow to make a proper national plan of this kind, but then so were England when compared to Australia and South Africa.

"We have to recognise that there are far more choices now for young people," says Hunte. "But we are not sitting around and just accepting that American television is around so we have a problem. We are doing something about it. The vast majority of the Caribbean community still sees cricket as an essential part of our culture. At the Barbados Test we had visitors from Bermuda, the States and Canada and they will all be involved if and when we stage the World Cup in 2005 or 2007."

Hunte has been the main broker in the deal which looks like finally ending the dispute among cricketing administrators in the United States. A genuinely representative body is due to be elected by April 15, paving the way, Hunte believes, for the removal of the legal threat to the plan for a cricket stadium at Disney World in Florida. American money and American television interest is still seen by some here as the eventual means of turning the recent downturn into a genuine expansion.

"By 2000 we will be spending a million US dollars a year on our development programme," Hunte says. "And from next year we expect to go back to a professional league from January to June with home and away matches. It may even be that there will be more teams, with countries like Antigua or St Vincent playing in their own right rather than as part of the Leewards or Windwards."

Given the weakness of the Windwards, not to mention the recent weakness of the board's finances, this sounds a little like whistling in the dark. The domestic competition had to be reduced by half to only one match between each region this year because of the lack of a sponsor, and there have been worrying signs of sponsors withdrawing from competitions within individual territories. In Barbados an international rum company withdrew their support for the premier club competition.

But Hunte forcefully denies that the game is in decline. "I reject the word decline," he contends, "even in places like Jamaica where other sports have gained ground. The under-15 competition there was a success this year and we have flourishing under-15 cricket elsewhere. The Antigua Test will be a sell-out and since that is where the board now have their headquarters and their new cricket academy, I'm confident, with the one-day internationals to come, that the game here is going to be seen in a better light by the end of the England tour."

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)