KING
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados (AP):
THE WEST Indies' first all-foreign coaching staff should be given more time to deliver results, according to a West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) committee evaluating their performance.
Coach Bennett King and his fellow Australians, assistant David Moore, physio Stephen Partridge, and fitness trainer Bryce Cavanagh, were reviewed by the WICB after the Guyana Cricket Board complained in January that the staff's total US$1 million (euro840,000) per year salary was not helping to produce improved results while the WICB was in heavy debt.
Since King, the team's first foreign coach, was contracted in October 2004 to a three-year deal, the West Indies have continued to languish, losing nine of 12 Tests, including their past seven. On tour in New Zealand, they lost the first Test on Sunday by 27 runs.
The four-member committee of former Jamaica player Jackie Hendriks, former West Indies players Deryck Murray and Desmond Haynes and former Leeward Islands player Enoch Lewis said in a media statement yesterday that there was "not sufficient evidence to work with" to determine whether the investment in the coaching staff had paid dividends.
The report noted King's and his staff's commitment to advancing West Indies cricket.
"They realise their future employment with the WICB depends very largely on an improvement of the team's performances over the next 18 months," the report said.
"The strides made with regard to fitness of players and technical improvement; the personal programmes given to each player to pursue on his own both in terms of fitness and technical aspects of their bowling and/or batting; the head coach was in complete charge of the West Indies team in accordance with his mandate and the results achieved by the team must be taken as an indication of the effectiveness of his tenure to date."
The staff's performance was undermined by off-the-field issues King had no control over; a lack of funds, and the contract dispute which hampered senior team selection for most of 2005, the committee said.
It recommended a West Indian understudy to King be appointed "to provide for succession planning" and help regional coaches provide a consistent coaching policy "so when the players are selected to the international team, they are already aware of the methods and routines that they will be expected to undergo."
