West Indies Cricket Fans

by Devon Dick

FORMER WEST Indies captain Christopher Gayle is in Zimbabwe playing T20 cricket while the West Indies team is touring India playing one-day cricket. The distance between Zimbabwe and India is indicative of the distance between Gayle and the cricket board in resolving differences. They are far apart.

This has been going on for far too long. This is not about whether Gayle is right or the board is right but about due process being followed and suitable or appropriate punishment for the crime.

Gayle's place in West Indies cricket is assured. How many cricketers have made two Test triple centuries like Gayle? Gayle was also the first person to make a century in T20 World Cup. His place in world cricket is also assured. Not many would have expected Gayle to rise to such dizzy heights, having suffered from heart problems while playing cricket.

As the situation stands, the effective punishment meted out by the board is a life ban on Gayle because it is alleged that he disrespected the coach and will not apologise. In athletics, one would get a two-year ban for deliberately using performance-enhancing drugs. If there is a repeat offence of cheating, then life bans. But there is due process. The charge is clearly stated. The athlete faces a disciplinary panel and can even have a lawyer to argue the case. And the disciplinary panel is different from the persons making the allegations. Not so with West Indies Cricket Board! Also, examine how FIFA handled the allegations against Captain Horace Burrell, former president of JFF, surrounding bribery at a Caribbean Football Union meeting in Trinidad. Burrell did not even pay the ruling body the courtesy of attending the hearing and all the punishment he got was three months suspension. Gayle has received a longer sentence than Burrell. That is not cricket!

Uprooting the don

Professor Sir Hilary Beckles, principal of the Cave Hill campus of the University of the West Indies and a director of the West Indies Cricket Board, said of Gayle: "Chris Gayle is the don", and in developing this analogy he added, "and those who follow him and his cohort in the team do relate to him as their don." He then outlined what is being done: "the West Indies Board is trying ... to uproot this donmanship out of the culture in much the same way that the Jamaican people are trying to uproot Dudus from their politics" (Gleaner May 12). They have clinically uprooted Chris and the silence in face of this injustice is shocking. How the West Indies board has uprooted Gayle appears heartless and ruthless.

This stalemate shows yet again the incompetence of the board. They have lost about a dozen arbitration battles with the West Indies Players Association. They appear incapable to manage the process fairly or to understand due process. It had an agenda of getting rid of Chris, which was inadvertently stated by an insider with clumsy metaphor.

Clive Lloyd, former West Indies cricket captain, said Chris should apologise because it does not take anything off Chris. However, the other side is, what does it add to the coach if he gets an apology? Apologies should not be forced. Just punish Chris for the offence through due process and move on.

Lloyd should remember that he led West Indian cricketers to join Kerry Packer Series because of mistreatment by the board. Some seven years ago, he reminded an audience in Birmingham, England, how cricketeres were mistreated.

This stalemate shows the incompetence, insensitivity and injustice of the West Indies Cricket Board and, therefore, it is time for the board to go.

Devon Dick is pastor of the Boulevard Baptist Church in St Andrew.