Jeffrey S. Mordecai, Contributor

Lloyd -file photo

The decline in West Indian Test cricket has reached another low point with the recent series defeat in Pakistan, which again causes the public to blame the usual suspects: the players with their huge egos, high, hard-currency salaries and individual failings, and the foreign coach.

But cricket is not the only sport in the West Indies that faces the competitive reality of playing international sport at the highest level. In fact, only cricket has the advantage of being able to pool the region's human resources.

Why then are our cricketers failing while our athletes and footballers have succeeded at the highest level in the last decade?

The administrators in these three sports will agree that they are blessed with an abundance of talent but face a common problem reflected in the following three truths about West Indian and Jamaican sport:

1. We produce world-class teenage talent from our secondary schools system;

2. That same teenage talent fails to develop into world-class adult talent unless consistently exposed to world-class competition;

3. We do not, as a region, provide world-class domestic competitions sufficient to ensure consistent exposure to world-class competition.

The first thing that we must understand is, the problem in West Indies cricket is not a problem peculiar to cricket but is also faced by the other sports and particularly the other two major sports, athletics and football. This leads to the obvious question: what solution have our athletic and football administrators found to solve this problem that our cricket administrators have failed to find?

Though Jamaica's athletic and football administrators have consistently sought to improve our domestic competitions, they have given priority in the short run to exposing our teenage talent to world-class foreign competition via American colleges in athletics and contracts with foreign clubs in football.

Viable domestic option

For example, in athletics, Jamaica has now reached the stage of development where innovators like Stephen Francis and innovations like the High Performance Centre at the University of Technology (UTech) are providing a viable domestic option to American colleges. The JAAA has not discouraged athletes from going abroad but instead, always encouraged it as a necessary part of their development in the prevailing circumstances. Today, when local options exist, the JAAA does not propose to abandon the opportunities offered by American colleges, even though it is a far from efficient or loyal system of developing Jamaican athletic talent.

Contrast this plan for the development of our teenage athletic talent with the situation created by our West Indian cricket administrators in the last two decades.

My generation wrongly believed that our 15-year stint as world champions was the general rule. Factually, it was the exception, when considered in the broader context of the 20th century. Exceptional superstars like Constantine, Headley, the three Ws, the Spin Twins, Sobers, Hall and Gibbs were never members of a world championship team, much less a team that dominated cricket for more than a decade.

The three truths stated above are the major reasons why, as a general rule in the 20th century, our cricket teams never dominated the world. Though we undoubtedly produced world-class players, we could not develop the depth of world-class talent and the consistency of performance necessary to dominate the world.

This analysis poses an obvious question: What was it that created the exceptional situation that made us the world champions of cricket in the 1980s and '90s? The answer is clear: professionalism in the 1970s when a large number of our top and second-level youth cricketers got professional cricketing opportunities in England, Scotland, Wales and even Holland, in significant numbers.

The result was that two sets of players benefited in large numbers:

1. Those who learned the valuable lessons of regularly playing cricket abroad for money in all types of conditions;

2. Those who got into national and club sides in the West Indies because of the professional exodus and thereby improved their chances of getting foreign professional contracts.

Professional contract

The rule in that period was, if you were good, young and ambitious, you could get a professional contract - whether at county or league level. The rule in the 1990s and evennow, is exactly the opposite.

Take for example, the institution of the four fast bowlers commonly credited with our world dominance. If Roberts, Holding, Croft and Garner were all unavailable there was Marshall, Daniels, Clarke and Davis available in the professional wings to replace them.

Eligibility Rule

The irrational among us will seek to blame the English for drastically reducing the number of county cricket contracts available to West Indian cricketers. But the English did no more than defend their local players to develop their team. On reflection, English administrators will be quite pleased with the results of their decision as most recently evidenced by the result of the 2004 series between England and the West Indies.

It was not English administrators but West Indian administrators who failed West Indies Cricket by not identifying other professional options to develop our young talent, for example, in South Africa and Australia, and then by imposing the unbelievable Eligibility Rule.

Instead of becoming virtual agents to our young teenage cricketers, to replace the opportunities lost, our administrators chose instead to put all their efforts into developing and improving our domestic regional and national competitions. This was and is an admirable policy initiative, for the long run, but cannot replace foreign professional competition in the short to medium term. Is it any wonder that the youngsters have such a hard time establishing themselves in the West Indian team?

The Eligibility Rule destroyed the very ingredient that led to our dominance of world-class cricket by providing that you cannot represent the West Indies unless you represent your territory in all the rounds of the domestic regional competition. In other words, if you secure a professional contract, you cannot play for the West Indies.

What is the equivalent rule in the other international sports? There is none.

Does Ricardo Gardner have to play every match in the domestic season for Harbour View to represent Jamaica in football? Do Brazil and Argentina prohibit their best players from playing abroad? Is Nike's sponsorship of Brazilian football conditional on Ronaldinho playing for a Brazilian club?

In contrast, our West Indian cricket administrators chose to disadvantage the West Indies when competing against Australia, South Africa, India, Pakistan and England with their highly competitive professional leagues by denying our top teenage players similar exposure.

The impact of the Eligibility Rule was to reverse the 1970s trend when it was our youngsters who got professional contracts to aid in their development. Ask Richards, Roberts, Lloyd or Hooper and the many others about the benefits of professional cricket at a young age.

Professional experience

In this context it must be remembered that teenage West Indian cricketers in the 1990s did not generally have agents, and therefore, primarily relied on the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and their national cricket boards for their development. In my opinion, the cricket administrators of the WICB have collectively failed this new generation of West Indian cricketers by their inability to recognise and apply the lessons of our recent cricketing past and by their failure to perform new but necessary roles.

If our players are required to compete with the best in the world, we must demand the same level of competence from our administrators, as international cricket is no different from any other highly competitive international sport regulated by an international body.

We must demand that our cricket administrators find ways to give our teenage cricketers professional experience.

We cannot allow West Indian cricket administrators to fail us again. Let's hope the WICB looks to develop the amazing young talent unearthed in the 2007 domestic season by finding them appropriate professional contracts abroad. The 2007 Cricket World Cup, which brings together the international cricketing world, would be a good place to start.