Windies board faces big task (22 January 1999)

22 January 1999

Windies board faces big task

Tony Becca

South Africa's 5-0 defeat of the West Indies has left cricket fans around the region dejected and calling for changes - left, right and centre.

Not surprisingly, based on the defeat and much of what contributed to it, the fans are calling for captain Brian Lara to go, and to a lesser extent, also manager Clive Lloyd, coach Malcolm Marshall and batsman Carl Hooper - the one they believe should be charged for breach of promise.

What is surprising, however, is that there are also fans who are calling for the head of West Indies Board president Pat Rousseau - surprising, not because there have always been and always will be people who cannot take a beating and will always look for a scapegoat or two, but because numbered among them are people who chastised the president and his board members for their action in response to the players' strike on the eve of the tour.

After firing Lara - the captain, and Hooper - the vice-captain - for instigating the strike and disobeying instructions to go to South Africa, the president and his board members were accused of being high-handed and of destroying West Indies cricket.

According to their accusers, which came from all walks of the Caribbean society, Lara and Hooper had a right to strike and whenever they wanted to.

Those, like Barbados Prime Minister Owen Arthur, who talked about principles, the players lack of commitment and defended the board's action, were ridiculed.

In the end, in respect to South African president Nelson Mandela and under pressure from heads of governments around the region, Rousseau and the board members backed off, the people, but for a few, were happy and Lara, Hooper and the team went off to South Africa with their blessings.

As it turned out, they were thrashed - not only because they were not good enough to win, but because of problems in the team, much of which had to do with a fall-out among the players when they heard the details of the discussions in London, and in their embarrassment the fans have not only turned on Lara and company but also on Rousseau and the board members.

The criticism now aimed at Rousseau and company is that they were weak. According to the fans, they are in office to lead, and Mandela or not, heads of governments or not, they should have stuck to their guns - even it meant, now that the team has lost and so badly at that, sending not only the team without Lara and Hooper, but if the other players sided with them as they did, another team.

Although there are many who believed from the beginning that despite the influence of politicians in a region like this, and the pettiness of some of them, that despite the respect of Mandela, the board should have stood its ground, instead of now criticising Rousseau and its members, those fans who accused them of all sorts of rubbish in November should apologise to them.

Rousseau and his board members may not have been right in fining all the players in the squad, but they were right in firing Lara and Hooper, they may not have been right in backing off, but despite what happened in South Africa, in the interest of West Indies cricket, they probably had no alternative.

What is important now, is that following South Africa, Rousseau, his board, and the selectors have some important decisions to make and hopefully, if and when they do what should be done, they will not be criticised by those who today, in their disappointment, are calling for Lara, Lloyd, Marshall and Hooper to go.

Source :: The Jamaica Gleaner (https://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/)