Whatever happens, the West Indies must now focus on the "real" job at hand

The immediate watchword, the absolute end-of-the-line, desperate word in the West Indies cricket team's dictionary, now, MUST be "focus". This is a very different word from "commitment" or "attitude". Some semblance and evidence of the latter two will also help.

With the-one day series just about getting to its conclusion, I honestly believe that the West Indies must now, immediately, if not sooner, shift its focus from one-day cricket to Test cricket. Indeed, that should have been done a week ago, even with the West Indies team, then, still trying to qualify for the NatWest one-day final.

After this last weekend, at that very beautiful cricket ground at Durham, that will not now happen, having lost to both England, due to a very lack-luster performance with the bat, and to Zimbabwe, after a poor performance with the ball. At least the team is full of all-rounders. Recently, the team has simply been all-round poor!

Simply, Test cricket is very much more important that one-day cricket, notwithstanding the fact that Jimmy Adams, the present West Indies captain, is adamant that "whenever he puts on the West Indies' colors, he only thinks about winning and doing well."

As much as that sentiment is agreeable and understandable, especially from the perspective of a former West Indies Test player, there could be no-one involved in cricket anywhere who would even think of suggesting that the priority of a cricket tour of about three months, which includes five Test matches and ten one-day games, is the same for each type of the game. One-day games could never be "as important" as Test cricket, never the same priority, regardless of whatever perspective from which the thought is taken.

The West Indian team sponsors in the United Kingdom, Sandals Resorts (headquartered in Jamaica) and Carib Breweries (headquartered in Trinidad & Tobago), should be fully pleased at the coverage they would have gotten by the time this cricket tour is completed. However, I am very sure that they would be infinitely more happy if the West Indies were to win the Test series, even before the team would have been eliminated from the Nat West one-day series.

Test cricket shows a team's ability to produce and sometimes win, collectively, over five days, even though, these days, it seems that Tests last only three days. Test cricket is perhaps more of a cricketer's game, while one-day cricket is basically for the spectators, an exciting day out, hopefully filled with slashes, runs and wickets at very regular intervals. No-one I have ever met wants to play one-day cricket more than Tests.

Over the last two weeks, the West Indies cricket team seemed lost, blundering from venue to venue with the same result; a losing effort. Indeed, since the Test match at Lord's, in which they defied every logic by "nearly winning", according to one of the team's supporters; (no team should win any Test game when that team makes 54 in an innings of that same game!), the West Indies have looked strangely not only out of touch, but even out of place.

It is rather difficult to understand, or more particularly accept this, since we are being led to believe that "all is well" and that "there is no problem" and that "a turnover has come." Where is it, may I ask? I prefer to believe that old proverb I heard somewhere, with something of a paraphrase.

"One can fool 'all of the people some of the time', or maybe 'some of the people all of the time'. However, one cannot fool 'everyone all of the time' and mostly, one cannot fool one's self." The West Indies cricket team, with all of their rhetorical "spin", certainly cannot fool me. They could well be convincing enough, in their own minds, to try to fool themselves.

I keep hearing that this is a "young" West Indies cricket team, and that this team has no experience to really be able to cope at the highest level continually, and that this is a "learning team". That, in my mind, is absolute garbage, a team hiding behind its own shadows. Here is a fact to back up my attitude to such thrash.

Every player in the West Indies cricket team's touring party, with the exception of Chris Gayle, has been on at least two international representative cricket tours BEFORE coming on this tour of the United Kingdom. Worse yet is the fact that except for Mahendra Nagamootoo, who just made his full international debut against Zimbabwe on Sunday July 16, and again Chris Gayle, every other player featuring in the international games have been on at least THREE overseas tours.

Those are more tours for these guys than first class matches played by either Michael Holding, Joel Garner or myself when we were selected for our first Test matches. We managed okay, I think. What the hell were these guys learning on these tours that they have had? From the recent poor performances, it certainly could not have been cricket!

I genuinely do not believe that many of the players who are now included in the West Indies cricket team really understand what they, or the sense of representing, are all about.

Unfortunately for me and many others who may have played at this level, or those who support the West Indies even if they, the supporters, may not have played at any level at all, this is the same attitude that was very visible for those recent ill-fated tours of Pakistan, South Africa and New Zealand. I was there, so no-one can tell me what I have seen in the past, and unfortunately, seem to be seeing again.

I do not think that most of the West Indies cricket team believe, or understand, that this is a job, one, like most other jobs, with great responsibilities. Many of these players take this as just another tour, where they would be paid, win lose or draw. Frankly, I have my reservations as to if many of these players even care at all!

Oh, they all say the right things when asked, like "I am doing my best", or "We will get it right at the right time," or perhaps "We have to be positive." All of that is crap. Many of these present West Indies cricketers are simply nothing else but pretenders.

I, for one, am fed up of the rhetoric. I want performances, not excuses. Their production, or lack thereof, speaks for itself. How much longer am I, or, for that matter, any other supporter, supposed "to wait"?

Sherwin Campbell, Jimmy Adams, Courtney Walsh, Curtly Ambrose, and to a lesser extent Ridley Jacobs and the returning Brian Lara should be seeing blood at some of the non-production of these so-called youths. Believe me, after especially South Africa and New Zealand, I have seen nothing in the last two weeks to convince me otherwise than to effectively believe that the same path is being taken again.

Many people involved in West Indies cricket seem to believe in fantasy, "hoping for the best." "Hope" does not happen at this international level. It takes special people, with very special talents, very special attitudes and very special commitments, to produce the goods needed at this level. If those involved are not ready to take up the cudgels, then they will be embarrassed, as the West Indies cricket team has been over the last two weeks. I am not a player anymore and I have certainly been very embarrassed recently at the team's performances. I sincerely hope that the present players have been similarly embarrassed. The only "hope" that I have is that my initial prediction of the West Indies cricket team winning the Test series 3-1 comes through at the end of the five Test series

I am sure that no-one expects the West Indies to win every game, or indeed win every series. Most, however, expect that the team would, firstly, look like a team, and more importantly, give the impression not only of playing as a team, but also to suggest that they are giving 100% to the very last man.

Many in the present West Indies cricket team seem to think that this is a situation of being a "show pony", looking good even if they produce little. This is not an auction, but international sport. International cricket is not measured by the "tightness" of the uniform, or the bulging biceps, but by the "correctness" of a square-cut, or pull, or the "pitch" of a leg-cutter; the production on the field of play.

One of the toughest things I have had to endure this last week was to listen to someone I have tremendous respect for, Sir Vivian Richards, wondering as to "what the .... is this that I am actually looking at?" It pains me terribly to know that someone as prominent as Sir Viv, one who has given so much for the sake of West Indies cricket, more than most of us who have even managed to play at that level, not to mention those who have not played at all, to be in a such a position not to even recognize the great game he has been immortalized in, as being played by the same team for which he was captain.

Yes, folks, I am sure that many of the people now playing cricket for the West Indies cricket team do not really understand their requirements. This is not a "given right." Playing for the West Indies is indeed an honor, a reward for tremendous effort, or at least, it should be.

More particularly, these guys who are selected for the West Indies cricket team represent me, not to mention another seven million people, when they take the field. I do not know what the other seven million think, and certainly cannot speak for those seven million people, but I certainly want to be represented "well" or "properly", by the West Indies cricket team. Unfortunately for me, at least, that representation is extremely poor, at best.

The "real" job at hand for the West Indies is to come out of this tour with something positive, something very tangible. That possibility now lies only in the Test series, a series that must be won at all costs.

The so-called younger brigade, without Walsh and/or Ambrose to "save" them, have been found wanting, and badly wanting at that. Every player in the West Indies cricket team must now take a highly introspective look, an even more definite HONEST look, at himself. Most, especially the so-called "youngsters", will recognize that all are falling well short of expectations.

Of the seven million people of the Caribbean, at least one, me, would say this honestly. I want proper representation. It is what I deserve. The present play of the West Indies cricket team is not representing me, at least, well. For the sake of the rest of the seven million, I hope that the West Indies cricket team would focus as their responsibilities; not next week or next game, but now!!