Listless West Indies whitewashed

The Toronto cricket festival saw India and Pakistan winning against a thoroughly disorganised West Indies team, the most charitable construction that can be put on its performance is that it is going through a process of re-building. But that's what was being said when the team was whitewashed by Pakistan and South Africa and then said again when they made their early exit from the World Cup.

In Toronto, the West Indies carried out a number of experiments, the batting order was shuffled so too was the bowling and we saw the new ball being given to an off-spinner! What remained consistent was Brian Lara's refusal to bat higher in the order. For someone who has had such a miserable 1999 one would have thought that he would have made some serious effort to bat his way out of a lean patch. More than that to lead from the front is the first requirement of a captain and Lara seemed strangely uninvolved, almost aloof.

There was about the West Indies performance a joylessness and they looked jaded, as if it was the end of the season rather than the start of it. Lara's own batting form weighed heavily on the others but was compounded by Chanderpaul's. He just couldn't get going. Sherwyn Campbell alone looked consistent but he fought a lone battle. There is Ricardo Powell and after his century in Singapore he was being touted as another Vivian Richards.

He is only 20-years old and it is too early to tell which way he will go. There is no doubt that he hits the ball very hard but presently he bears a greater resemblance to Shahid Afridi than to Vivian Richards. He will need to be coached on certain basics, notably shot selection. He looked vulnerable to the outgoing ball and he will have to learn to leave well alone and not go fishing.

Wavell Hinds, among the newcomers, shows promise but if he is to develop he will need security. Unless he is assured of his place in the team and an assured slot in the batting order, his promise will be unfulfilled. There is a lot of work to be done by the West Indies and Clive Lloyd is planning to call it a day. I don't think he was able to stamp his authority on the team. The team seems to be controlled by Brian Lara and it is not a question of semantics whether he is an innovative captain or a whimsical one.

Wasim Akram who was reinstated as captain in the same hurried manner in which he was suspended wore the strain to which he has been put through and although he did everything right, I got the impression that he wasn't enjoying himself. There was a certain sadness in the television interview he gave to ESPN. He openly talked about Moin Khan as his successor as if to suggest that his own career was ending.

He mentioned that he had enrolled in some classes and wanted to catch up on his education that he had missed because he had been involved full-time in his cricket career. I cannot think of another sporting star who has been put through the wringer as he has been. Every cricket expert in the world acknowledges him as among the greatest cricketers of alltime. He is rated as the best captain in cricket today, an inspiring leader, a shrewd tactician who sets a high personal example in making things happen. He nursed Shoaib Akhtar along during the World Cup, he saw him not as a fastbowling rival but as his partner. He has had a big hand in the development of Saqlain Mushtaq and ungrudgingly acknowledges the contribution that Moin Khan makes as his deputy.

Even Imran did not get the same loyalty from his players as Wasim Akram does. Like Imran, he's nobody's stooge. He is his own man. Lesser men would have been dragged down by what he has had to endure, would have become bitter but even in Toronto when he was far from being match-fit, he was giving his hundred per cent.

It was wonderful to see him go down to the boundary line and talk to the young and still raw Shabbir Ahmed after he had bowled a spate of wides, had been talked to by the umpire for running on the wicket. The talk, obviously, did good because after it this exciting tearaway fast bowler from Khanewal was bang on target. There is still a lot of cricket left in Wasim Akram and if Pakistan has any chance of giving Australia a run for their money, if not beating them, Pakistan will need Wasim Akram not only matchfit but mentally free of the suspicions and allegations that have dogged him.

The time has come, one feels, to grill his accusers a little more closely. If they can prove their case, then Wasim should be punished. If they can't, then they should be punished. It's gone on too long and justice cries out that the smearing of our cricketers should be brought to an end. It would have made a good soap opera for it had all the ingredients of a shifting plot, intrigues and characters coming and going in their defined roles as heroes and villains and many with walk-on parts. But a soap opera is fictional. The match-fixing allegations may in the end prove to be fictitious but until it is resolved, it is very much real life.

In the meantime, the news about Sachin Tendulkar is not good. The specialist in Australia has hinted that his back problem would probably limit his career. This surely must mean that Sachin will have to be far more selective about the tournaments he should play in. If his own Board does not do it for him, Sachin himself should decide how much cricket he wants to play. Needless to say that he is far too good a cricketer to be paraded around as a star attraction in country fairs and carnivals.