West Indies fast-bowling legend Michael Holding says the structure of cricket in the region is failing its players. He has also called for more transparency from the region’s governing body, Cricket West Indies (CWI), about its financial affairs.

Holding, who was a guest on the Antigua and Barbuda-based Good Morning Jojo Sports Talk Show recently, says players across the region are opting for more lucrative opportunities in Twenty20 (T20) cricket leagues around the world instead of representing the West Indies because of the problems that exist within the structure of the game in the region.

“I think the system has failed,” he said. “I don’t know about the talent in the team right now. I wouldn’t be able to tell you that the talent is what you’d like, but I know that the talent in the Caribbean has not faded. There’s no way you can lose talent. It just doesn’t disappear. But the system that we have now just doesn’t bring that talent through, in my opinion, and also because of the fact that there’s so much other T20 cricket going on around the world, where guys can earn a lot of money, so they disappear in that direction.”

Holding, who has always been known as a critic of T20 cricket, recalls being disappointed to see how many players he considered of high talent playing for other teams while the Windies was touring at the same time.

“I don’t watch West Indies cricket a lot now, I keep on telling people, I go on ESPN and I check the score, but I don’t watch it,” he said. “But I remember a tour of Australia some years ago where we had about nine cricketers playing the Big Bash (Australian T20 league) when West Indies was on tour there. None of them played for the West Indies, but they were in the Big Bash earning big money.

“Now, if we had all that talent playing in the West Indies team and not playing the T20 tournaments, we would not be where we are. So the system plus the T20 tournaments is destroying our cricket. Both are to be blamed.”

Some pundits have questioned whether CWI’s frequent personnel changes, especially that of the team’s head coach and captain, are hurting the team more than doing good and have asked whether it is CWI’s way of trying to keep up with the global modernising of the game, especially since the role of head coach has taken on more significance in recent times than during Holding’s playing days.

But he says head coaches have an important role.

“I know the game has changed a lot,” he said. “I would not say that we don’t need coaches today, because the game has changed. But, at the same time, changing the coach, changing the president, changing the support staff is not gonna change the situation with West Indies cricket. It needs to change itself starting from the structure of the board, and the structure of our cricket, and trying to make sure that, that is right, first of all. I keep on preaching, but it’s going nowhere, that we need a transparent organisation running our cricket and an organisation that’s accountable to something or someone.”

This is why he calls for more access to financial audits, as he believes it allows for better corporate support, which will assist in development.

“Right now they are unaccountable,” he said. “They don’t have to answer to anyone. They do as they like and nobody can question them. Well, you question them, but you don’t get any answers. An audit report was done recently and I was fortunate enough to see it. It stunk! But it wasn’t released to the public.

“That sort of thing must stop, because when things go wrong within an organisation people must know. This is not a private organisation that they keep on trying to tell people that they can’t show the public. It is responsible for cricket, that’s a public matter here in the Caribbean. You can’t tell me that the organisation is private when they are responsible for a public matter. People in the Caribbean suffer when the West Indies does badly. I have seen people cry in the stands in Leeds when West Indies lost a Test match in two days. Until we get things to change, we’re going nowhere, because we’re losing sponsors. Who’s going to put money into an organisation and you don’t know what’s happening with that money? It’s ridiculous. If you have your house in order, there’s a chance of compromise. I ain’t working for anybody I don’t trust, especially if there’s bigger money outside. So we need to put our house in order.”

Holding, now a retired commentator, represented the West Indies from 1975 to 1987. In that time he won the ICC World Cup in 1979 and broke the record for best bowling figures in a Test match by a West Indies bowler — 14 wickets for 149 runs. It is a record that still stands today.