A sorry state of affairs – my experience of WI cricket

During the summer of 2012, I had the pleasure of going to Antigua with my school on a cricket trip and I’m not exaggerating when I say that it was the best two weeks of my life. It is impossible to not fall in love with the place. The beaches are terrific, the weather superb and it is a nation that adores its cricket.

They live and breathe cricket like it’s the only thing that matters. In the hotel, we were stopped to chat about England’s chances in the World T20, text-gate (I’m not bringing that up again, don’t worry) to why the waitress wasn’t a fan of RP Singh!

The best thing is they love the pure bits of cricket. They don’t care about the DRS or the Big Three takeover, the umpires were more interested in congratulating any bouncers.

However, as I sit here and watch another massive defeat at the hands of the South Africans, I can’t help but wonder where things went wrong. Why can a country with the history and passion of West Indies fail to produce an acceptable performance.

I, personally, don’t think it’s got anything to do with the rise of T20 cricket. Although the test match I watched in Antigua had a completely empty ground, this was more to do with extortionate ticket prices rather than a lack of interest. Our matches got more spectators than the test match due to the fact that the locals could watch cricket for free and even so, the test match was still being watched where it was free.

No, instead I think the main problem lies with the WICB and it’s invovlement in cricket at grass-roots level and the professional.

The talent was there. Their opening bowler came off a Bob-Willis-esque run up and proceeded to bowl bouncers at my head, stare at me for staying alive before retorting “Welcome to Antigua”. They had an opening batsman who was 15 but hooking every bouncer like it was a tennis ball – and he was wasn’t wearing a helmet.

However, they rarely won due to some suit-wearing dictator coach (not Andy Flower) who seemed like he wanted to physically abuse his players for every mistake. The opposition were afraid of playing.

It was later revealed that this coach was actually a Government official who liked cricket so made himself head coach of the Under 15’s team. I’m not making that up. The WICB let it happen.

So, in my opinion, if the WICB want to improve the future, they need to look at the past.

West Indies have one of the most impressive histories of any cricketing nation and with players such as Lara to Sir Viv to Sir Curtley, there’s a wealth of experience and knowledge to draw on.

However, Sir Viv Richards has recently been coaching Delhi Daredevils as part of the IPL, with his involvement in West Indies cricket limited.

Therein lies the problem and probably the solution