The Caribbean Calypso conjures magic, evokes nostalgia, generates a wave of emotions, springs up the pride, and rekindles a joy, enthusiasm, a spirit of play and much more. It brings in memory the best of the lives but equally the present and the immediate past leads to memories of sadness, a despair of what was once powerful but now hanging at the bottom. It represented an achievement what would be a pinnacle for a career now it is something to be best left to journeyman awaiting their chances for a momentary glory. What one is talking without doubt is the cricket and its accompanying and joys and culture in the land of the calypso, the Caribbean, the West Indies.
The West Indies, once the masters of whatever they surveyed are now the also rans of the cricketing world. They are the reigning champions of the T-20 World Cup but those moments are more an aberration rather than restoration or resurrection. Every now and then, they give their fans an occasion to slip back into those wonderful memories and perhaps delude and those days are back again. The outcome is only to be disappointed at the downfall. It was not just the play of a sport of cricket but a culture that spawned all over the islands. The participation of the islanders into the game made it all the more different something perhaps that was missing in the orthodoxy of England or Australia.
As one digs up the nostalgic pride, there arises a query would the West Indian cricket hit those heights of glory yet again. Those are unlikely to hit those heights in vacuum but certainly would need conditions that make that possible. There is often talk of migration to US and its basketball flavours that killed West Indian cricket but empirical evidence does not suggest so. Neither would the appeal of its superstar athletes like Usain Bolt nor do others cause a shift from cricket to track and field. The reasons for the downfall were inward and thus the solutions too lie in some ways within the methods the Caribbean cricket is structured.
Cricket spread to the British Caribbean perhaps in the 19th century from England. The organized tournaments began in the late 19th century. Yet the distance between islands and the transportation woes made limited participation possible. Trinidad and Tobago and the mainland British Guyana were able to play matches with each other before Jamaica joined them. It must be noted that Jamaica lay far west and might not have easy to commute between the islands. Barbados joined them later. The other islands under British Empire joined the bandwagon far later and could not and even now do not field individual teams for the local competitions. It is possible, the distance might have made it very difficult for colonies like Belize, Bahamas, Cayman Islands, Bermuda to participate in the West Indian competitions. Since they were colonies of Britain, eleven islands in addition to mainland British Guyana combined to form West Indies and became a Test playing country in 1929. It was in the 1960’s that some of the territories began gaining independence from Britain. The Leeward and Windward Island groups of countries secured their independence beginning only in the early 1980s.
The common unity in securing independence from Britain ensured the team performed unitedly. The inter-island politics was visible even in the immediate post war era. The captains would have to be from the local island if the test match was being played over there. Dropping of a local player caused mayhem. But captains like Frank Worrell and later Clive Lloyd ensured through their leadership, these differences were sorted out and did not affect the performance of the team. There was further a point to be proven against their colonial masters. Furthermore, the team was comprised mainly of black players. In the world of South African apartheid, the black victories and supremacy of West Indies in cricket served them a sense of unity and pride against their white oppressors.
The conditions by late 1980s and early 1990s changed a lot. The end of apartheid and re-entry of South Africa led to loss of the last reason to keep the team united. Moreover, the talent began to decline partly because of the low population. No longer could the collective Caribbean pride be made overwhelming to result in superlative performances. The national considerations and inter-island politics began to over-ride these broader pride of representing the West Indies. No longer could they be united by a common cause. The cause which was black answer to white and colonial supremacy. With the passage of time, the monetary considerations too began to play its role more so because of the inefficiency of the administration. Talks of split is not something unknown of. In the current context, it would thus be instructive to examine any possible way out.
There seems a way out and that perhaps is not something comforting. It would be distressing to the whole generation that feasted on Caribbean dominance and mastery. The solution lies in breakup of the West Indies cricket team. However, distressing it might seem prima facie, it is not all that so as we dig deeper. One key reason for the decline in performance is the inability to rise because of the motivating factors. Either the West Indies be converted to multinational franchisee in T-20 something akin to IPL franchisees or else build on the national pride to lift up the performances. The financial conditions are certainly not conducive for high pay. The pay disputes are nothing new and trace their roots in the current avatar to 1998 when Lara and team holed up in a hotel in London refusing to go ahead with their maiden tour to South Africa.
The split will have to be accommodated in some ways by the ICC in its organizational structure. The modus operandi can work in the following way. Test cricket can continue to see West Indies as a single team. As number of countries playing Tests will reduce further, going forward, this should not be an issue. Women’s Tests might even turn extinct and give way completely to T20. In the one-day internationals, the West Indies might make its appearance as a combined team in the World Cup but play separately in the other competitions. This would be something like British countries playing separately in competitions, but come as united team of Great Britain in the Olympics. It is T20, the West Indies be allowed to play as individual countries. This would spur the competition in ways unexpected and might actually be a boon in disguise. With the passage of time, some of the countries and territories are likely to emerge as great cricketing powers in their own right. It is not that they were not earlier. At one point, if a dream XI were to build up for the whole world, it could contain almost all players from one island of Barbados. Those days might emerge again. The tests could be an occasion for the collective pride whereas the T20s are likely to be the source for individual country and territory pride. One dayers are anyway likely to be caught in the middle and thus the mix suggested for the same might work well. This mix across the three formats might seem to be best way forward for the golden future of Caribbean cricket.
Thoughts on Theory and Practice 