WEST INDIES cricket is not as strong as it is used to be and, to its credit, the West Indies Cricket Board is making an effort to make it strong again.
Based on some of the things the Board is doing, however, it is looking for a quick fix, and the sooner it realises that there is no shortcut to success, the better it will be for West Indies cricket.
In recent years, the Board has been spending its money on batting coaches, bowling coaches and fielding coaches, coaching sessions for players and coaches, seminars for trainers, groundstaff and scorers, and pre-series camps.
It has also been flying players, young players, and coaches around the islands for short sessions, and although too much coaching can be detrimental to the development of young players, especially if it attempts to change rather than encourage and if necessary correct, nothing is basically wrong with that.
What is wrong is the apparent attitude of the Board, certainly some of its staff, to the territories. The same territories that produced the great West Indies players of the past are being treated as if they do not know how to develop players as if they cannot develop young players.
The Board, in fact, has taken on the responsibility to develop the region's promising young players to such an extent that some of the territories are complaining, albeit quietly, that the Board has little or no respect for them.
The latest move by the Board, its attempt to give the West Indies B team priority status over territorial teams in the 2004 Carib Beer Series, is a perfect example.
In previous years, the territories selected their squad and then the West Indies selectors selected the West Indies B squad. Up to a few days ago, however, the Board was suggesting and was insisting that the B squad, players under age 23, be selected first and that cannot be right.
According to members of the Board, there were three reasons for the move. One was to ensure the strength of the B team, one was to expose more young players leading up to the 2007 World Cup, and one was to have them playing together.
Whatever the reason, it was not good enough, it was not good enough for some good reasons, and thank God, the Board has decided to forget it - at least for the coming season.
Apart from the fact that the competition was designed for national teams, to represent ones country is an honour second to none, every cricketer dreams of representing his country.
PREFER TO REPRESENT HIS COUNTRY
If given the choice, he will obviously prefer to represent his country than to represent some pick up team or other, the younger he is, the greater the achievement in representing his country, he may be good enough to do so at 19, 20, 21, or 22 and not good enough later on, and no one, including the members of the West Indies Board, should deny him that honour.
On top of that, if the B team has first choice the national team will not be at full strength, and again no one, including the members of the Board, has any right to do anything that will prevent a national team from fielding its best team.
If the Board was allowed to have its way, the national teams would not then be at full strength, and it would not be at full strength, not only because players are on West Indies duty, but also because some of the players the countries have developed and groomed would have been playing against them.
Even if the Board has or had no problem with a competition of weak teams instead of one with some strong teams, even if it believes or believed that winning is not important, even if, as some of its coaches and selectors have said, it believes or believed the territories, in the interest of West Indies cricket, should not play to win, that would not have been fair to the sponsors in the territories and to the fans.
Based on the Board's latest communication to its affiliates, it will be looking at the situation again next year, and when it does, before coming back with the same proposal, before ruling that the West Indies B should have first pick, it should also look around and see what such a move would mean to most teams - certainly to the Windward Islands and the Leeward Islands whose teams comprise mostly young players, and to Jamaica.
STUCK TO ITS GUNS
Had the Board stuck to its guns for the coming season, Jamaica, for example, would have had a serious problem.
With the West Indies team in South Africa, Jamaica, up to now, will be without four or five players - including three of their four top batsmen and possibly all four, they will be looking to the likes of Brenton Parchment, Donovan Pagon, Shawn Findlay, David Bernard Jnr., and Andrew Richardson to fill those places, and although Bernard, like Jermaine Lawson and Jerome Taylor, could not be touched because he has represented the West Indies, if they were taken away, who would have been left to represent Jamaica and what would the Jamaica team have been like.
It would have been interesting to see how many fans would have turned up in Antigua to watch Jamaica, without Chris Gayle, Wavell Hinds, Marlon Samuels, Carlton Baugh Jnr and possibly Ricardo Powell playing against the West Indies B team which could have included four Jamaicans - possibly Parchment, Pagon, Findlay and Richardson.
The Board, obviously, believed that it was making a good move, but if it had gone ahead with its plan, it would only have shot itself in the foot.
Hopefully when the Board meets again, the members will realise that even if there are advantages, the disadvantages far outweigh them and that first pick to the B team simply does not make any sense - certainly not if the idea is to improve the standard of West Indies cricket and to build a strong West Indies team.
