Gayle (left) and Lara (right)
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, CMC:
The West Indies was the only full member of the International Cricket Council that was not represented at the annual meeting of Test captains in Sydney recently.
With Shivnarine Chanderpaul preoccupied with leading Guyana in the KFC Cup limited overs competition, the West Indies had no one available to represent them.
Former captain Brian Lara, along with Chris Gayle were both contacted by the West Indies Cricket Board to fill the role at the meeting but both turned down the invitation.
"In the circumstances, I emailed Brian (Lara) on September 20 asking if he would represent the West Indies," Zorol Barthley, the WICB's chief cricket operations officer told the Stabroek News.
"He replied last Tuesday, the day before the meeting, declining the request."
NOTICE TOO LATE
Gayle, who along with Lara is involved in the ongoing Super Series, was scheduled to return to Jamaica the next day and said the notice was too late.
All other captains of Test playing nations were present at the ceremony including Ricky Ponting (Australia), Habibul Bashar (Bangladesh), Inzamam-ul-Haq (Pakistan), Graeme Smith (South Africa), Marvan Atapattu (Sri Lanka) and Tatenda Taibu (Zimbabwe).
England skipper Michael Vaughan, New Zealand's Stephen Fleming and India's Sourav Ganguly were absent but were represented by Andrew Flintoff, Daniel Vettori, Rahul Dravid respectively.
