Windies: waiting for the uprising

he sang a few years ago.

Nothing in the Caribbean escapes politics; Toussaint Louverture inspired the Haitian slaves to revolt and Jean Jacques Dessalines, a man of distinctly Napoleonic tendencies, carried it a step further, crowning himself Emperor. Dessalines wasn't too particular about how he exacted revenge on the pale enemy, particularly the English, and I reckon that is what Rudder is getting at - in a purely cricketing sense, mind.

Others are not so sure there will be an uprising any time soon. There was no escaping the topic of the decline during the most humiliating moments of West Indies tepid efforts at Lord's and Headingley and the consensus was that the team are in deep, long-term trouble. These players - without Lara, without Chanderpaul, without Sarwan, and without conviction - looked no more capable of a revolution than England did of beating Australia last winter.

Their every movement cried resignation. They fielded poorly, yet showed little remorse. Their batting so appalled their Australian coach during the capitulation in Leeds that he hardly knew what to tell them. There was no point. There was nothing coming back. It was like watching a fighter waiting to get knocked out.

I don't wholly agree with the view that their bowling is near to the worst of the major Test nations. They had their moments, mostly through Corey Collymore, occasionally Daren Powell. But there was not much bite.

They are a strange outfit because there is some talent there. Chris Gayle is one of those on-his-day batsmen, Dwayne Bravo now and again has been bravissimo. Shivnarine Chanderpaul remains a fine player, although I'm not sure if he will be as effective without Brian Lara - and his retirement looks premature.

That has been West Indies problem for too long: there is little sense of collective responsibility - so unlike their outstanding teams of the 1970s and 1980s, sides with players determined to remake the game to their own liking. They all got into fantastic condition and set about the opposition with an intoxicating mix of physicality and confidence.

Nobody embodied that spirit more totally than Viv Richards. He looked like a king, batted like a god. And all around him were other wonderful batters and what amounted to a glut of fast bowlers. It hardly mattered which combination of four pacemen was selected: they were all fast, accurate, clever and tireless. They ground down batsmen, who knew there would be no let-up. It was probably the most perfect all-round Test team in the history of the game. Those sides set standards that only Australia have reached since in striving for complete domination.

What I also remember about those days is how certain put-upon commentators and writers failed miserably to hide their indignation at their teams being humbled so often and so irrefutably. There was eternal whinging about intimidation, campaigns to blunt the power of the bouncer. None of this hysteria would have reached the back page, of course, had it been England, Australia or anyone else dishing out the punishment.

I wonder what those timid complainers are thinking now. Some will take heart in the sight of shadowy successors trundling in now for West Indies.

I can't share the glee. Cricket needs a West Indies team at or near the top of its game. They provide by some way the most excitement cricket has to offer, far more than the ruthless Australian sides that supplanted them.

In as much as cricket is art - and it is - no nation marries the game to something intellectually more stimulating than a mere sport than do the islands of the West Indies. There is, as Rudder would note, a political dimension to their success that does not attend the results of other ex-colonial sides.

There is music in every ball but menace as well, whether the orb is being propelled down the wicket or dismissed over the fence. At its most explosive, such cricket borders on the angry. Playing against any West Indian side always looked to be a high-risk exercise. Not so now. We all have favourite moments of West Indies cricket. The image seared in my memory is the final over of the tied Test in Brisbane in 1961, Wes Hall straining to the point of exhaustion among the lengthening shadows as Australia's tail swayed before him. It typified the spirit and the commitment.

But who wants a great team to rot in aspic? West Indies have to reinvent themselves, somehow, and that doesn't mean just finding another great fast bowler or bowlers, or batsmen to give them faith in their cause.

One of the most disturbing moments of this short tour was the departure of their captain, ruled out of the series through injury. Ramnaresh Sarwan needed to stay. He sent out a very poor signal by going home, whatever the inconvenience of his hurt shoulder. West Indies need to rediscover their pride. But for fleeting passages of play that is what was missing at Lord's and Headingley and it was a sad sight indeed.