ST. JOHN'S, Antigua, CMC: EXECUTIVES OF the West Indies Cricket Board and West Indies Players' Association (WIPA) were locked in a lengthy meeting late yesterday evening trying to thrash out a settlement over the players' take from their World Cup sponsorship.
The West Indies players, unhappy over the distribution of payments from the LNM Group sponsorship deal announced in Trinidad on Tuesday morning, withdrew from a media access session here later that day to highlight their discomfort with the sponsorship allocation.
The meeting had gone into its fifth hour approaching 8.00 p.m. East Caribbean Time, with no indication of a resolution.
The WICB yesterday morning gave its acting Chief Executive Officer Roger Brathwaite a mandate to negotiate a settlement with WIPA on the issue.
The WICB told Brathwaite the settlement "should be fair to the players and on a basis that is consistent with past West Indies practice as well as in keeping with the current financial realities of the WICB".
The WICB, in a statement, said it was also committed to ensuring that there is "minimal disruption of the team's preparation for the Cricket World Cup 2003" and that the tour goes ahead as planned with the players and the WICB fulfilling their obligations to the sponsors, the International Cricket Council (ICC) and the Caribbean fans.
The WICB emphasised that the dispute is not over the players' fees for the World Cup, since those agreements had long been finalised.
