Dennis Morrison

A group of friends who were at Sabina Park last weekend to watch the Pakistan -West Indies Test match were, like me, quite disappointed with the performance of the home team, particularly the bowlers and wicketkeeper.
Except for Corey Colleymore, the bowlers seemed to approach their tasks with very little mental application and the wicketkeeper put down a regulation catch, which would have got rid of Inzaman for a duck and influenced significantly the outcome of the match. Like the bowlers, the wicketkeeper did not appear to have the composure for Test cricket.

It was obvious from the attendance on Saturday and Sunday, the usual peak days for Test matches, that Jamaican fans are losing enthusiasm for the game, and this is directly linked to the poor showing of the West Indies in recent times. The ground was less than half-full on both days and the encouraging performance of Brian Lara and the other batsmen on Saturday had no effect on Sunday's attendance level.

This lukewarm response from the Jamaican fans follows right after the Bajans stayed away from Kensington in the First Test match of the series. And we can expect that the downhill movement of crowd support will continue as long as the West Indies players remain nonchalant in their approach to the game.

That the slide in crowd support should be happening less than two years before Cricket World Cup 2007 is worrisome. The organisers should not expect a major turnaround unless there is clear evidence of a revitalisation of the West Indies team. Is such a thing possible in the limited time that is left?
Last year's results in the One Day competition in England may offer some hope but the present captain, Chanderpaul, does not have the personality or savvy to spur such fighting spirit from his team members. What of Lara? Can he make a comeback in the role of captain? This must be one of the big issues puzzling the selectors and team managers.

More fundamental is the matter of how to restore a culture of excellence in West Indies cricket. Given the reservoir of knowledge and technical expertise embedded in our past players, this should not be a daunting task, and in any case we ought not to be struggling to hold a top spot in world cricket. Caribbean countries do not possess this quality of human resources or accumulated knowledge in any other field. Indeed, we are constantly seeking to acquire technical expertise and arranging the transfer of technology from outside the region in many fields in order to support social and economic development programmes. And huge sums are spent for patent rights and commissions for franchises.

In the game of cricket, the West Indies is easily one of the leaders in terms of the technical know-how and experience of its retired players of recent vintage or of the long past. The expertise of these players covers all departments of the game and their mastery of batting, bowling and wicketkeeping is recognised throughout the world cricket system. In light of this, my group of friends and others are wondering why the administrators of West Indies cricket have completely ignored this tremendous pool of resources even as the region is slipping rapidly to the bottom of the list of cricketing nations. Why is it that the other nations have drawn from this pool, but we are yet to develop structured programmes to transfer the technical know-how of past West Indies players to our young cricketers?

Clive Lloyd spoke recently of the urgent need to establish a Fast Bowling School in the West Indies. There is no shortage of retired great West Indies fast bowlers who could be mobilised to form a panel of tutors for such a school.
Moreover, regular three- or four-month courses could be organised in different Caribbean countries on a year-round basis for young fast bowlers. Instructors for these courses could be drawn from Courtney Walsh, Michael Holding, Andy Roberts, Joel Garner, Curtly Ambrose and Colin Croft who are recognised as outstanding practitioners. Couldn't an enterprising business person easily mobilise private-sector sponsorship for this kind of programme?

Similar courses could also be arranged for young batsmen and be serviced by the long list of retired West Indies batsmen who were the conquerors of the best bowlers from other nations. The batting techniques of our great players of the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s and the first half of the 1990s have been copied across the cricketing world, as have those of our feared fast bowlers. Are the administrators of West Indies cricket so bereft of creativity and initiative that they cannot conceive and promote programmes of this nature? Would they even consider this approach were proposals along these lines to be put to them by sports organisers?

It is painful to watch the West Indies team floundering from one Test series to another while we possess a body of knowledge and expertise that is the envy of our competitors but which is untapped. Success in any field in the early years of the 21st century is primarily a function of technical know-how and the quality of human resources. The West Indies' competitive advantage in these areas is greater in cricket than in any other field, but these attributes lie dormant while we are being humiliated. What is missing and what is crucial to the unleashing of our competitive advantage is modern organisational systems, a recurring weakness in West Indian society.

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