By: TONY COZIER

There has been trouble between West Indian players and the cricket board in the past, but it has not led to a termination of a tour. This time, we didn’t realize that the players were initially upset with what West Indies Players’ Association president Wavell Hinds had agreed to in the MOU with Dave Cameron, the West Indies Cricket Board president, till they reached India . And when they got there, the problem went from one extreme to the other. From what we hear and what we read the tour could have been called off before it even started.

The situation could have been easily resolved if as soon as Bravo and the team’s objections were made known before the first ODI, the WICB president, one of his directors and Hinds had hopped on a plane immediately and gone to India to meet the players face-to-face and say let’s get this thing sorted out. But all of the communication between them was through emails and it became more and more angry and personal from both sides. It just drove them further and further apart.]

To me it seems that the players, their association, Hinds and the WICB really underestimated the consequences of pulling out in the midst of an Indian tour.

I think they were shocked when the BCCI came out with a strong statement and followed it up by putting all cricketing ties with the West Indies on hold. When India tours these days — with television rights, advertising, sponsors and so on —they put a lot of money into the coffers of respective cricket boards. So West Indies will be looking on with trepidation.

If a solution is not found in the near future, it will affect most players. Those like Dwayne Bravo, Kieron Pollard, Dwayne Smith are approaching the end of their careers or are those who haven’t played many first-class matches in the Caribbean for the past four to five years – may not mind freelancing in the various T20 leagues around the world. But someone like a Jason Holder, who plays for my club in the Barbados, and who I know pretty well will be bitterly disappointed if he cannot represent the West Indies again.

Representing Chennai, Hyderabad or Perth in T20 doesn’t have the same value as playing for the West Indies.

Ever since the first players strike in 1998-99, I have feared that there could be a possibility of West Indies cricket withering away. Every single year, there has been something cropping up between the players and the board. Some of the players might still say ‘I’m done with the West Indies’ and move on.

According to the new agreement, the first-class players in the West Indies will be better paid than they ever have been before and that is a sign that the West Indies Cricket Board is trying to manage the game professionally. The previous MOU, which was existent till recently, was very strongly in favour of the players, and that’s why the board said let’s renew it now.

Bravo and his team said right ‘we are okay with sharing but don’t cut our fees to a great extent’. But that’s what has seemed to have happened. The fact that the players went to India without having signed a contract — it’s not the first time that’s happened — just shows the incompetence of the WICB.

With regard to the percentage of revenue that will be cut from the top players’ earnings, we’ve all been trying to work that out. I still can’t believe, based on the figures that Bravo has put down, that they’re taking a 90 per cent pay-cut.

Little empathy

But even so, the players have done themselves no favours as far as I’m concerned. They are saying ‘we are only cricketers and we only have a short lifespan and at the end of it what are we going to do to feed our families.’

These fellows are wealthy guys by West Indian standards. Some players are as wealthy as any prime minister. So when they make that kind of talk, the fellow who’s saving up his money and coming to watch cricket (in the Caribbean) — a clerk in a bank or somebody in a low-paying job — it doesn’t ring true with them at all. I have to work 10 years to make that kind of money.

Then people over here say but look, ‘Where are we? We are No.8 in the world. We’re just above Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.’ These fellows are pushing for increase in pay but people can’t understand why. Of course, these players won’t take a pay-cut for poor performances. Ideally, with where our cricket is, they wouldn’t seem to have a leg to stand on, forget about where your bargaining rights are. You look at Chris Gayle, Pollard, Bravo. Only in India, is their image even worth anything. The whole thing is a mess. But the WICB hasn’t handled it all well. You know you have Prima donnas in the squad, but that’s why you are there as the accredited organisation to look after the well-being of West Indies cricket.

Leadership is poor across the Caribbean, not just in cricket. We’ve got this very weak political organisation called the CARICOM, the Caribbean trinity. Nothing comes off it. For instance, Barbados fishermen, who go into Trinidad waters are arrested and put into prison. Last week, Trinidad issued a list of illegal immigrants who are in the country. Most of them were from the territories from which the West Indies cricket team is formed. I have feared fragmentation for a while now. But I know at least one Prime Minister, Keith Mitchell from Grenada, will get involved to sort it out. He had mediated in an earlier stand-off between the players and the board. Cricket means a lot to those small territories. For example, the England tour next year when around 10,000 English supporters come out, that’s a big boost for tourism. I think the current mess in West Indies cricket has turned off more people in the Caribbean than before. But we can only keep our fingers crossed. The one optimistic way of looking at it is that this is the last one, and it won’t happen again because it’s been so serious. But for that, the WICB will have to get their act together.

I think the current mess in West Indies cricket has turned off more people in the Caribbean than before. But we can only keep our fingers crossed. The one optimistic way of looking at it is that this is the last one, and it won’t happen again because it’s been so serious. But for that, the WICB will have to get their act together

(Cozier has been commenting and writing on West Indian cricket for over 50 years and is based in Barbados. He spoke to Bharat Sundaresan.)