West Indies board president promises resolution

Julian Hunte, the West Indies board president, has vowed to resolve the problems between the WICB and the players' association (WIPA) during his term in office and not pass them off to his successor.

The latest issue in this long-standing row has been the boycott of the first Test against Bangladesh by the original squad on the prompting of the WIPA, which claimed the players had not been given contracts for the last four series. After the board put together a second-string squad for the match, the two bodies met on Thursday to discuss the issue but the talks failed just 23 minutes into the meeting as WIPA refused to give in to the board's demand that the strike had to end before further discussions could take place.

Hunte said the board had been unsuccessfully trying to negotiate with the players' body in between series. "Before a series starts, there will be a flurry of activity, and then they [WIPA] will want to meet to negotiate," Hunte was quoted as saying by Caribbean Media Corporation. "This is not good industrial relations practice, and we are going to put a stop to this. This is damaging to West Indies cricket and these problems before tours and during tours must be eliminated."

Hunte said the board members would meet over the weekend and be briefed by the negotiating committee before announcing their next move.