Prince at the controls

It isn't the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) that would seem to be in control of cricket in the region of late. It appears to be Brian Lara.

He is the first player in the history of West Indies cricket who has ever had the audacity to dictate the terms of his availability to the board. He is more than a prince, he is a king if not by name, by nature and practice.

It is important to note that the power he wields comes with a knowledge of who he is and what he is worth. He has ensured that the yardstick cannot only measure his talent but his human value as well. They have had to deal with the man first and foremost; the cricketing aspect has become secondary. He has earned my utmost respect in this regard.

Some might argue that it is his perceived financial security that reinforces his moral capital to take certain stands but it also takes singlemindedness and courage to pull it off.

Lara has both because he knows who he is: not only a player that is still capable of being the best batsman in the world when the mood hits him but a man who views himself as an aristocrat and determine to rule his own destiny.

No board in the Caribbean has been able to find a strategy to penetrate his solid defence. And there will be none if he remains true to himself and his beliefs.

It's not even a case of a player being indispensible at a time when his team is in transition and knows that his input is invaluable. It's simply a matter of respect: man-to-man, face-to-face dialogue.

Of course, there was an era when the shoe was on the other foot. The board had things in control to keep the players in line, sometimes causing bad blood between players and those in authority.

There is evidence of several of the former Test greats leaving the arena being dissatisfied with the way they were treated, especially at the end of their careers.

There is no likelihood that this will happen to a Brian Lara. He has been large and in charge ever since he forced the board to ask him to return to the squad after he left the team on the 1995 tour of England. The coup de grace was the players revolt he led in London where the team was intransit to South Africa.

His political clout was enhanced and he has used it ever since to put the board in line rather than the other way round even when there might have been instances to draw the line with him.

So Reverend Wes Hall might have missed the point recently when he asked the media to stop pressuring Lara. We can when there are fundamental reasons to do so, but the WICB certainly does not appear as if it can under any circumstances.

More power to King Lara.