What has happended to West Indies Cricket?

[aussie1st]

Pretty much extends back to the end of their domination. They failed in the transition period and they have been paying for it since. Takes some effort overturning a decade of losing and being near the bottom of the Test rankings.

After the Test series, I thought things were looking up the Windies but the ODI series came along and then the loss to Zimbabwe. Still they haven't played a Test since us so who knows they might still be on the up. I do hope they get a full strength side soon so we can see what they can do.

 

[Dare]

Andre "Dare's favourite" Fletcher.

Hardly my favorite. The guy has lots of potential but just hasnt shown anything apart from a few performances. WI biggest problem, a quality keeper.

Braithwaite yea, but not Holder. Saw him in the Under-19 WC & although he has the fast-bowlers height & stuff - his pace was hardly reaching 80 mph. So don't think he is ready for the step up to international cricket right now, he needs to do something for Barbados & add on some pace.

Holder wont be a real quick bowler by the looks of it, more like a Courtney Walsh towards the end of his career. In the 20/20s he used his excellent accuracy and bounce to get wickets. I didn't say that he should play all international matches but he could have been called up for this series against Zimbabwe. It just sucks that he didn't get to play against Zimbabwe in their warm up match against University of the West Indies.

 

[Robelinda]

Well, I dunno, WI had some great players before the 80's, but they were not a top team from when they started Test cricket up until say 1976 in England. They were regularly beaten in the 40's, 50's and 60's but had obviously a few great names, Sobers, Hall etc. One could say it was a major fluke they somehow got the great players in the same team for the great 80's.

Apart from the 15 years dominant period they have been ordinary.

 

[Dare]

Well during the 1990s the WI won 3rd most test matches behind the Aussies and Pakistan.

What the West Indies had from the 60s to early 2000s was depth and players didn't have to be rushed in because there wasn't anybody good to play. Its the same case for the Aussies now.
Back then Garner/Marshall/Holding/Roberts/Croft had Hall,Griffith,Sobers,Boyce and then Walsh,Ambrose,Bishop had Garner,Holding,Marshall. It was the same thing for the batting.
It wasn't Jerome Taylor and Fidel Edwards being thrown in after just one First Class match.


In the 1960s WI were 4rd once again in test match wins behind the Aussies and English but were 4th in tests played. In the 1970s WI were once again 3rd in test wins and 4th in tests played. They did well enough during those 4 years.

 

[Robelinda]

Depth is everything aint it? Whats odd is how the depth just disappeared from around the mid 80's. You could see the players coming in that werent up to the high standard, like Phil Simmons, Benjamin Bros, Carl Hooper, Anderson Cummins, even guys like Gus Logie. Though obviously some great names came later, Lara, Shiv. But nowhere near as many as before, when the WI always seemed to have many long term players at the ready, like Bishop, Richardson, Ambrose, Walsh.

Dont really see them rising again, and whats the deal with all the pint sized fast bowlers?

 

[Dare]

Depth is everything aint it? Whats odd is how the depth just disappeared from around the mid 80's. You could see the players coming in that werent up to the high standard, like Phil Simmons, Benjamin Bros, Carl Hooper, Anderson Cummins, even guys like Gus Logie. Though obviously some great names came later, Lara, Shiv. But nowhere near as many as before, when the WI always seemed to have many long term players at the ready, like Bishop, Richardson, Ambrose, Walsh.

Well I guess before the 80s/90s everyone was on the same level when it came to facilities and player preparation. It was all the same, play as much cricket as you can and just go to the nearest field and practice but over time other countries improved and got their cricket in order. There were youth academies developed, players were/are being paid good money to play cricket and the countries developed and therefore the funding in sports increased.
There is no way that Jamaica,Barbados,T&T can invest as much money into player development as Australia, England, South Africa and India. The West Indies together cant invest that amount of money.

Dont really see them rising again, and whats the deal with all the pint sized fast bowlers?

No idea, the tall men seem to be lazy and are becoming spinners. Ask Rabs what he thinks of 6'7 Benn playing as a spinner. There is Jason Holder who is 18 and 6'7 and was probably top3 fast bowler of the Under 19 world cup.

 

[Varun]

Their problem is that they Dwayne Smith isn't getting a lot of chance. In good form against Aussies, I wonder why he is not playing against Zimbabwe. Maybe injured.

 

[Owzat]

It was a sad decline, West Indies legends retired and they were never truly replaced. They managed through the 90s with Ambrose, Walsh, Lara and Chanderpaul in the side, but when England beat West Indies in 2000 for the first time in a VERY long time that was it. Even with Walsh and Ambrose bowling at them England managed to pick off the other bowlers and then the West Indies dramatically collapsed when England for a rare occurence themselves played Cork, Gough AND Caddick in the same side and took the West Indies apart. Once Ambrose and Walsh retired that was more or less it, Lara, Chanderpaul and some others. To be fair one or two bowlers have come through and looked nearly men, but the batting is too fragile and there's not enough bowling to carry them very far.

The problem won't be helped by the side being so poor, watching your team get thumped is hardly a way to excite youngsters into wanting to take up the sport. Maybe the West Indies should move away from USA, that might help! Once the likes of Greenidge, Haynes, Marshall, Richards and Dujon retired the side became at best average and continued to slide. England did very well to draw the 1991 series, for me a better performance than the 2000 series win against a much weaker West Indies. I reckon maybe even the win that should have been out in West Indies around 1989/1990 was a better England performance, robbed only by cheating tactics of bowling 11 overs an hour so England didn't reach their target :

Needing 151 to win, with virtually all day in which to get them, England were given a positive launch, 25 coming from six overs. Larkins then fell to Moseley, who struck a more grievous blow by banishing Gooch in agony. The extent of his injury was kept from the England players while they fretted through the rain-ruined afternoon. When play resumed, in barely fit conditions, 78 were required from 30 overs, of which only seventeen were bowled before the light became too dangerous. England had lost wickets at vital times and, just fleetingly, a West Indies win had seemed possible. With delaying tactics of a blatant nature dictating the pace of the play, it was an unsatisfactory finish to an otherwise marvellous match.

Wisden - WEST INDIES v ENGLAND 1989-90

Crucial point in the series, 1-0 up at the time of this 3rd Test with the chance to go dormie 2-0 up with two to play, England denied by weather and cheating. Sure England might have tried the same, but I doubt they could have managed to waste as much time and as many balls/overs. Fortunately not too many games finish so close to the wire, these days it seems to be the batting side wanting to waste time more than the fielding side and it's easier to waste time when bowling, there are certainly more tricks like intricate field setting, tying bootlaces, changing your mind over who bowls, aborting run-ups, bouncing excessively, bowling as wide as is legal, bodyline etc. Batsmen can waste time, but not quite as often without being obvious during an over.

 

[Robelinda]

Oh yeah I agree, that 1990 series was close until that painful draw where England wouldve cantered to a win. The WI also werent great in 1991, Eng did great to draw, as in 1995 too after Aus beat the WI. In 92/93 WI got out of jail BIG TIME to win in Australia, we had em by the throat. The sings were well and truly obvious as far back as 1987. WI didnt have a great run in ODI's either, losing some big tournaments and not doing so well in the 97 or 92 WC, or the 86/87 WSC, or 1991/92 WSC.

 

[sifter132]

Simmons looked good with the bat?????

Haha. Yeah I mentioned this point at some stage in the Windies tour of Aus thread and got shot down too. I think I must have watched the one game where he looked the goods. It was the T20 world cup last year where he made 77 v South Africa. That's the only good thing I've seen him do EVER. But then again, that's what I and everyone else was saying about Cameron White 1-2 years ago... And of course everyone is sucking Kieron Pollard off (and paying him big bucks) even though he's only made it past 50 once in international cricket.

Oh and I also had no idea Simmons or Fletcher could keep wicket before today -you learn something new...


And while I'm here, there's a big problem with your cricket when the players are striking and b) the West Indies boys just don't work hard enough in training. They have the talent, but when former Rugby League coach Steve Folkes went over to be the trainer for the team he found it quiet challenging to motivate them to work. Article's here if you are interested:

Windies need new fitness attitude: Folkes

When Folkes asks an NRL player to jump, they ask ''how high?''. When he asks the Windies players, they ask ''why?'

 

[Paki007]

I think what the most W indies player lack is mental toughness.They just sometimes outplay the opposition and most of the times they prove to be a wall of sand for the opposition team

It's not the talent they lack .They have some exciting players but they don't utilize this talent properly