Holding M: WI Team status v England (Jan94)

Matter of Dependency - by Michael Holding

To play or not to play. To rest or not to rest. These are the questions posed by Ritchie Richardson's plea to the WICBC on behalf of his two key fast bowlers, Curtley Ambrose and Courtney Walsh.

Richardson's concern is that Ambrose in particular has had too much cricket, is tired and needs to take some matches off in the Red Stripe Cup so that he can be fit and raring to go in the Test Series against England.

I didn't see either Ambrose or Walsh bowl during the tours of Sharjah, India and Sri Lanka so I can only go by the reports. Richardson was not the only one who commented that Ambrose looked listless. Manager David Holford and the commentators said the same thing and the statistics tend to support them.

I can understand the captain's position. Our fast bowling is not as strong as it used to be, it has already lost Ian Bishop and for either Ambrose or Walsh to break down would be a tremendous setback.

But it is a little difficult now for teh WICBC to accede to such a request. The West Indian public is looking forward to a really top-class season, with all the Test players back, for the first time in three years. Even more than that, our young players will have the chance of rubbing shoulders with the stars, of playing with and against them. The season is very limited as it is, with only five matches for each team, so our up-and-comers have only a few chances at first-class level. It is important that they get the best standard of cricket whenever possible.

Instead, the selectors should have put more thought in their selection for the tour to Sharjah, India and Sri Lanka and left at home any key player they felt needed spelling. It was done in the past when Joel Garner, Andy Roberts, Malcolm Marshall and myself all had a tour off. Although the Test against Sri Lanka was important historically, all the other matches were one day internationals and it wasn't essential to have Ambrose in the team.

I know the question of tour fees come into it and it is unlikely that any player would take too kindly to being rested without any recompense. Since it is likely to arise again, the WICBC should be ready for it.

I believe it should earmark some of its funds for a special, interest-bearing account that it would utilise in future to pay for those they believe need a rest but would be missing out on tour fees if they are. Australia and England have a system whereby they put their top players on contract which covers a similar eventuality but I am not sure that would work in the West Indies. It would mean paying out money that is not returnable and depleting WICBC funds. Under the scheme I envisage, the interest on the account would pay any player rested from a team for which he would have normally been chosen.

The issue has arisen because our fast bowling stocks are not what they were. It was probably too much to expect that they would always remain as plentiful as they were 10 years ago when the selectors chose four fast bowlers not simply because they were fast but because they were the best available.

I feel they should always stick to that policy of picking the best that they can. If that means three fast bowlers and one slow or two fast and two slow, so be it. It's no point having four men running up from far if they're not doing what they're supposed to, get wickets.

Because of our success, England tried to have a four-pronged pace attack and so even did India for a while. Of course, it didn't work because they just didn't have that number of quality fast bowlers. I suppose now that the Indians have gone back to spin and done well and Shane Warne has become so effective with his leg-spin for Australia, other countries will be turning to spinners. But the criterion has got to be the same for all bowlers. They have to be good enough to merit their place.

The Red Stripe Cup precedes the Test series against England for which the West Indies must start favourites, given their home advantage and the relative records of the two teams. But I have a care aboutt the inconsistency of the batting.

In the 1980s, we could pinpoint three or four batsmen and say with certainity we could depend on them. That has gone lately. When that happens, it puts responsibility even on the lower order to produce but this has not been happening either, as it used to.

When Clive Lloyd was captain, he recognised that all eleven team members had to bat and he made sure that everyone had time in the nets. Sometimes, he would even have the fast bowlers pad up and go in first. It paid off to the extent that Andy Roberts, Joel Garner and myself all managed to get halfcenturies in Tests and the last four or five wickets could be relied on to pull their weight.

At present, the West Indies seem to be depending too much on too few players, hence the worry over Ambrose. It's time for more of a team effort.