AFTER West Indies cricket took another debilitating body blow on Friday when the men’s team missed out on the Super 12 stage of the Twenty20 World Cup in Australia, former President Whycliffe “Dave” Cameron is calling on current boss Ricky Skerritt and Head Coach Phil Simmons to both step aside.

The two-time former champions West Indies, needing to defeat Ireland in the final Group B qualifier in Hobart to join some of the globe’s elite teams in the Super 12s, were smashed out of the park.

The Irishmen’s nine-wicket win was every bit as dominant as the scoreboard suggests as they cruised to 150-1 in 17 overs and three balls in response to the Caribbean side’s woefully subpar 146-6.

The loss condemned West Indies to last place in the four-team group on two points after only one win.

Zimbabwe won the group with four points, ahead of Ireland who ended with the same number of points but were behind due to an inferior net run rate. Scotland, who shocked West Indies in their group opener, were third with two points.

“[To say I am] hurt is an understatement… to see all the stuff we put in place and the trajectory and to see everything just pretty much blow up in front of you, it’s difficult to swallow,” Cameron, who headed Cricket West Indies (CWI) from 2013 to 2019 and had been a board director since 2002, told the Jamaica Observer.

“The Skerritt/Shallow experiment has failed and it’s about time they pack their bags and go,” he added in reference to the leadership of Skerritt and Vice-President Kishore Shallow.

Cameron was also openly critical of Simmons, who had been axed during the former CWI boss’ tenure only to be reappointed after Skerritt won the presidential election in 2019.

“It is now very clear the reason why Phil Simmons was fired and he’s now shown again he’s not at the level to coach the West Indies team,” Cameron, also scathing in social media posts, charged.

The West Indies’ humiliation in Australia follows the shambolic performance at last year’s T20 World Cup in United Arab Emirates and Oman where they failed to reach the semi-finals.

The regional team also performed poorly at the 50-over World Cup in England three years ago, failing to reach the semi-finals after winning only two preliminary stage matches.

In a statement on Friday Skerritt, who blamed batsmen for “untimely shot selections”, insisted his Administration can remedy the regional team’s lamentable decline in white-ball cricket.

“I am deeply disappointed with the performance results of our team in Australia and I appreciate the sense of utter frustration that is being experienced by many.

“…I want to assure stakeholders that a thorough post-mortem will be carried out on all aspects of our World Cup preparation and performance, and that solutions will be found in keeping with CWI’s strategy to improve the quality and sustainability of cricket on all fronts and in all formats,” the statement read.

West Indies won the T20 World Cup in 2012 and 2016.