It was only Friday last that I had mentioned to the president of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) that the unethical behaviour of all the stakeholders involved with West Indian cricket was a demonstration of their lack of professionalism which has provided many of the ills of the game in the region.
When Clive Lloyd rushed to the Sports Max Zone to give an explanation to the viewing public of the Caribbean the reasons for selecting Jason Holder as captain of the WI team, followed by reasons for the omission of Denesh Ramdin as captain seeing that he had not scored sufficiently, his decision to go to the media himself with decisions which were privy only to the selectors and the board was an error of judgment. He used the media to give his personal explanations to the public.
More recently, members of the boards were rushing to the media to indicate that the decision to omit Ramdin was not unanimous, after the chairman of the WICB said that it was.
So my dear friends, the precedent was set well in advance over the years, especially during the battle following the players’ walkout from the Test series in India.
Phil Simmons is well known for his diligence in the business of his cricket with great commitment, proof of which he dedicated his life as a coach with the Irish national cricket team until he had achieved his goals.
Surely, his comments to the press about the selection argument among the selectors and himself, sounded as though there was no room for Kieron Pollard and Dwayne Bravo for reasons which were not based upon performances, and further to that, he probably saw the crucial decision as coach, should have been given more consideration, seeing that the chairman of the panel and the coach of the team shared similar opinions over the issue.
His outburst would normally be considered unprofessional.
But here is a case of the pot calling the kettle black. Who can challenge the former hard hitting opening batsman for believing that speaking about these issues were no longer kept behind closed doors.
What is even more distasteful about the entire affair is the fact that the omissions of Pollard and Bravo must have been because of what was considered an act of ill-discipline. In that case, the selection panel was not within their right to omit these players unless the members of the board had taken a decision to suspend them on that behaviour.
Now, I ask the question: who made the decision to suspend Phil Simmons?
Surely, the right way to deal with the issue will have been for the coach to approach the Board for what was obviously an imbalanced decision by the selectors, unusual because the decision of the coach should have been given more consideration, especially as the chairman agreed with his choice.
If that approach failed, then he had to be prepared to resign in order to make his position clear. The coach takes the responsibility for the players’ performances and none of Courtney Walsh, Courtney Browne or Eldine Baptiste would be blamed for failure.
Ironically enough, one wonders who selected Baptiste as the new coach. Is it the selection panel or the Board? I wonder.