Is West Indies cricket heading back to its glory days?
Every ICC tournament, whether ODI or T20, leaves behind many stories which are and will be talked about by many people in the years to come. The ICC World T20 2016 hosted by India, was no different. It left behind many stories of players and teams which gave it their all or were not able to perform on the big stage.
For example, Afghanistan- a war-torn country, had a good World T20 campaign. They maintained a perfect record in the qualifying stage with three wins out of three. In the Super-10s, they fought hard against South Africa, England and Sri Lanka, before winning against eventual champions West Indies.
One of the highlights was Mohammad Shahzad’s innings of 44 from just 19 balls to get Afghanistan off to a flying start against South Africa.
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Another inspirational story of the tournament was that of the ‘Champions’, the West Indies.
When the World T20 was starting, nobody had given them a chance because of some terrible showings over the past two-three years. It is no secret that West Indies cricket has been marred by many conflicts between the players and the board but none was as big as the one which started between the players and their representatives in 2014 when West Indies had toured India.
As the players landed in Delhi, they were unaware that the West Indies Player’s Association’s (WIPA- the representatives of the players) head Wavell Hinds had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) which reduced the player’s salaries by 80%.
Unhappy with this back-stabbing, the West Indies squad, led by Dwayne Bravo announced during the toss for the fourth ODI that they were calling the tour off and would play no further part in the series. This decision had serious consequences as WICB and WIPA were humiliated on the international stage.
The outcome was that players like Dwayne Bravo, Kieron Pollard, Darren Sammy and Chris Gayle were not regulars in the side. Also, Bravo and Pollard weren’t picked in the 15- member squad for the ICC World Cup in 2015.
Things weren’t too good for the WICB in more ways than one. First, the BCCI demanded a heavy amount ($65 million) as damages since the series had to be canceled midway.
Had the BCCI pressed charges against WICB, the latter would have been suspended under Clause 2.7- which suggests that should West Indies be deemed to have "fail[ed] to fulfill any of its financial obligations", "fail[ed] to comply with any of its membership obligations", or "act[ed] in such a way as shall be deemed by the Executive Board to bring the game of cricket into disrepute", then "the Executive Board shall be entitled to suspend that Member with immediate effect".
Now, due to the unavailability of many senior players in their ranks, the board sent a largely second-string side comprising of many youngsters like Carlos Brathwaite, Kemar Roach and Sheldon Cottrell, with the only regular senior players being Sulieman Benn, Dinesh Ramdin and Marlon Samuels.
The inexperience showed as the Windies stumbled many series defeat across all formats under young skipper Jason Holder.
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Although Gayle, Sammy and Andre Russell were included in the 15 member squad for the 2015 ICC World Cup, they couldn’t do anything to improve the fortunes of the team as they crashed out in the quarterfinals, not before being given a mighty scare by Scotland and losing to Ireland.
Their last- eight exit and the fact that Bangladesh too exited the quarterfinals of the same tournament meant that the West Indies were facing a battle to maintain their 8th place in the ODI rankings.
But lesser number of matches, some poor results for them and a few famous ODI series wins for Bangladesh meant that West Indies were not one of the top 8 ODI teams in the world as of 30th September 2015 and hence, didn’t make the cut for participation in the 2017 ICC Champion’s Trophy, a first since the inception of the tournament in 1998 and this was really shocking for cricket fans all over the world.
Though West Indies were losing more Tests and ODIs than they were winning, it was not so in the T20Is. They had started 2016 as the top-ranked T20 side in the world, and that may have been one of the reasons that made them one of the contenders.