Column | Can West Indies bounce back?

The name Simpson Clairmonte “Sammy” Guillen will not ring a bell for cricket fans of the present generation. They can be pardoned as this name would not have been recognised even by observers of the game during the 1950s when Guillen played international cricket.

A wicketkeeper hailing from Trinidad, his claim for fame was the fact that he played Test cricket for two countries during his career that lasted eight matches. He played five Tests for the West Indies against Australia in 1951-52 and three matches for New Zealand in 1956. He emigrated to New Zealand in 1952 and settled down in Canterbury. Incidentally, all the Tests he turned out for the Kiwis were against the West Indies!

It can be said that Guillen brought good luck for the Kiwis as they won their first ever Test during the series against the West Indies in 1956. Here also Guillen played a part as it was his stumping of Alf Valentine off the bowling of Harry Cave that brought the victory for his side. He retired from international cricket after this match. For the record, Guillen was also good at football and played for Western AFC as a goalkeeper in Chatham Cup in 1954.

Losing a Test to New Zealand would have created some heartburn for the West Indies in the 1950s. But it is unlikely that the would have blamed Guillen for this setback. However, they would not have reckoned for the fact that his grandson would one day be destined to write the epitaph of the West Indies in International Cricket Council (ICC) World Cup, where they had been winners on two occasions. Yes, Logan van Beek, the cricketer from Netherlands who stunned the West Indies in the ICC World Cup Qualifier through an amazing performance in the Super Over, wherein he hit 30 runs and took two wickets conceding a mere eight runs, is the grandson of Guillen!

It was bad for the West Indies, once the uncrowned kings of limited overs cricket, to be relegated to a position where they had to take part in the qualifiers to play in the World Cup. The Netherlands were not reputed to be a strong side and the Windies were expected to win the game without breaking much sweat. It appeared to be heading in that direction when they posted a total of 374/6 in their allotted 50 overs, helped by a stroke-filled 111 by Nicholas Pooran and a cameo by Keemo Paul (46 off 25 balls). But the Dutch had other ideas and they managed to tie the scores, riding on the back of brilliant knocks by Teja Nidamanuru (111 off 76 balls) and skipper Scott Edwards (67 off 46 balls). Van Beek too chipped in with a quick-fire 28 off 14 balls, before he was dismissed off the last ball of the innings.

The Super Over pitted van Beek against Jason Holder. He struck three sixes and three boundaries to score 30 runs, placing the game almost beyond the reach of the West Indians. And to rub it in, he bowled a brilliant over wherein he dismissed Johnson Charles and Romario Shepherd off successive deliveries to clinch a sensational win for his side. Van Beek is an opening bowler and a lower-order batsman who can strike the ball hard. Though he was born in New Zealand, he plays international cricket for the Netherlands. Like his grandfather, he excels at other sports too and turned out for New Zealand  in the world Under-19 Basketball championship in 2009, before deciding to make cricket his preferred career. He also doubles up as a sports coach in Canterbury. 

The Netherlands' win can be viewed as an example of the growing popularity of cricket in countries where it is not traditionally played and the feats of van Beek deserve a round of applause but the talk of the town was the fall of the once mighty West Indies. Even worse was to follow for the cricketers from the Caribbean as they went down without a fight to lose by seven wickets to Scotland in Super Six game that followed. These defeats at the hands of the two minnows had followed a loss against Zimbabwe in the first group game and together they served to eliminate West Indies from the race for a spot in the 2023 World Cup. As an observer put it, the West Indies fielded poorly, fiddled around their batting order and bowled without direction. Can there be an easier recipe for disaster on the cricket field? 

What has happened to West Indies cricket that they are reduced to their present plight? The West Indies is not a nation-state like other Test playing countries but instead refers to a collection of islands and archipelagos in the North Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea. Some of these islands such as Cuba, Trinidad, Jamaica etc are independent countries while some of the smaller ones are in the nature of dependencies. Cricket became popular in areas under the British rule and many talented players were spotted here. However, as individual islands were too small and did not have the ability to put up teams of sufficient strength, it was decided to bring them all under the broad umbrella of an independent entity named the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB), who were granted membership of Imperial Cricket Conference, forerunner to the present day ICC. The West Indies played their first ever Test match in 1928, thus becoming the fourth side to do so after England, Australia and South Africa.

Cricket in the Caribbean remained under the control of Englishmen till the early 1960s. Though they possessed a string of exceptionally talented players as George Headley (nicknamed “Black Bradman”), Learie Constantine, Alf Valentine, Clyde Walcott, Everton Weekes etc, the team did not win as many matches as they should have, given their potential. This state of affairs changed when Frank Worrell was appointed to lead the side in 1960, thus becoming the first “non-white” to be chosen for this job. Worrell moulded the side of talented yet temperamental players into a cohesive unit and made a top drawer team out of them.

The West Indies went from strength to strength during the 1960s and 1970s. Gary Sobers, the greatest all-rounder to adorn the annals of the game, Viv Richards, one of the most destructive batsmen cricket has seen, besides batting maestros such as Rohan Kanhai, Clive Lloyd, Gordon Greenidge, Alvin Kallicharran and  Desmond Haynes gave their batting the right mix of aggression and stability. But what lent an air of excitement to the spectators was an unending supply chain of fast bowers, who breathed fire and terrorised batsmen all over the world. Lloyd, who took over the mantle of captaincy in 1974, soon evolved into an astute leader and the team was almost unbeatable during the entire decade starting from 1976, the odd defeat not withstanding.

The side maintained their momentum for some years after Lloyd retired from the game in 1985 but it was clear that their days of unchallenged supremacy was over. Despite the emergence of Brian Lara, who became one of the finest batsmen the game has seen, cracks started appearing in the side, which grew wider as time went by. They started losing Test matches and even series on home turf, something unthinkable in their heyday. More importantly, their standing in limited overs cricket, where they were always considered a potent force, started slipping downwards. And even worse, no one, from the administrators downwards, seemed to have no clue as to how to arrest this slide. 

Many causes have been trotted out for this development. The first is that youngsters are more keen to take up sports such as basketball as it fetches bigger returns financially and afforded better social mobility. The repeated and longstanding feuds between players and the administrators over many issues, ranging from remuneration to discipline, did not improve matters either. Further, the emergence of various T20 leagues in different parts of the globe, which offer higher payment also made many young players choose clubs and franchisees over Windies. 

However, these factors did not prevent emergence of explosive cricketers such as Chris Gayle, Shai Hope, Marlon Samuels, Nicholas Pooran, Fidel Edwards and Tino Best from making the grade and displaying their wares in international cricket. The West Indies won the ICC T20 World Cup twice - in 2012 and 2016 - triggering hopes that this could be the signal of revival of their fortunes in One-Day Internationals (ODIs) and Tests. But this was not to be as the side continued to languish at the bottom of the heap in both these  versions.

Fierce pride was the outstanding feature of the West Indies teams that rose to the top in international cricket. They did not take kindly when Tony Greig once famously said “we will make them grovel” and showed the England skipper his place during the series that followed. On a similar note, they struck back after the humiliation of losing the 1983 World Cup final to India by blanking the winners in the ODIs and Test series that followed. In the past, they had risen from the dumps whenever their pride was hurt and come back with a vengeance. 

The defeats at the hands of the Netherlands and Scotland and the consequent elimination from the World Cup Qualifier is a resounding slap on the face of the former champions. Let us wait and see whether the team possesses the firepower and gumption to bounce back from the deep hole they have boxed themselves in. I join all followers of the game in hoping that they stage a comeback as the cricketing world will be poorer without the exciting presence of the players from the Caribbean.

 (The author is a former international cricket umpire and a senior bureaucrat)