Certainly Sunday April 3, 2016 will remain in our history books as one of the most significant accomplishments for the people of the West Indies as both our Women’s and Men’s T20 teams demonstrated impressive victories in the World Cup Twenty20 tournament.
However, I hope that in the midst of our jubilation that we are not clouded by this accomplishment to erroneously conclude that all is right with West Indian cricket.
Before the moisture from the match ball could hardly dry, in the after-game interview, Captain Darren Sammy said enough to re-affirm and remind a world audience, that all is far from right in the administrative quarters of West Indies cricket.
More importantly he was deliberate in giving praise and recognition to Dr Keith Mitchell, Prime Minister of Grenada (and the Chairman of Caricom’s sub-committee on cricket governance), while in the same conversation, Sammy used the media platform of the world stage, to chastise the West Indies Cricket Board on several fronts.
While I welcomed the intervention of Caricom in this exercise and I subscribe to the view that there must now be a complete overall of the management of West Indian cricket, I wish to present some suggestions in moving this process forward.
I am sure that many will appreciate that this can be a very sensitive and complex undertaking as there are many stakeholders involved who contribute to the mechanism and inevitably the valuable brand of West Indian Cricket. These stakeholders comprise players, coaches, fans, sponsors, governing bodies, investors, broadcasters. Developing a system of governance that would ensure that the critical role played by our stakeholders is encouraged and respected is the only way forward, if we are to effectively develop a system that can achieve long-term sustainability in West Indian cricket.
The accepted seven principles that usually influence organisational governance of sporting organisations and other public welfare-oriented organisations are: transparency, accountability, democracy, responsibility, equity, effectiveness and efficiency.
It is reasonable to infer that if we evaluate the performance of the WICB using this matrix, that they would have failed on all accounts. But important to note, is that based on a winning team’s opinion, the players have lost confidence in not only the people who manage West Indies cricket, but also the system of management that currently prevails.
Let us be reminded that this is a management system of a body that must now have the resources and competencies to deal with the numerous fiscal, marketing and human resources challenges that the world of sport now faces. The environment that now prevails routinely sees players making, in some cases, US$800,000 to play in a two-month T-20 tournament—sometimes four times a year across the cricketing world. This is a management system that originally catered for and organised a sport that was played in a particular season—very different from what exists today, where cricket is played all-year round.
The current management system (WICB) has to be dismantled and restructured if West Indies cricket is to survive let alone to prosper.
New management must employ strategies that would keep at the forefront, the conditionality of the environment in which our cricket is now played. But more importantly, the players must be kept at the forefront and not the personalities of the members of the board.
The existence of the board depends solely on the existence of the players; and not the other way around. In essence, our talented players of this region can almost exist and have lucrative careers and not put on a West Indies shirt. This is a path that is available to them, and this is the risk that is poised to threaten what is still one of the last bastions of West Indian integration—West Indian cricket.
The million-dollar question is, what is the way forward? And with the recent developments with the Caricom subcommittee commissioning an investigative panel, headed by the UWI Cave Hill Principal Professor Eudine Bariteau, we must ask the question, what must be the role of the Caribbean governments?
The impact and extent of their involvement must also be determined, but surely as the primary advocate for change, their engagement over the last few months has been admirable and welcomed to say the least. Their choice to utilise the services of the resources at the UWI to begin the process, is also astute, with Caricom being mindful of the value that this regional body has brought to the Caribbean islands for over 60 years.
Usually, if all was well with the WICB, it would be acceptable for the intervention of Caribbean governments to only place emphasis on “steering” rather than commanding change.
But under these current circumstances, there is reasonable evidence that the Board has demonstrated poor stewardship, lack of transparency and other detracting elements, that has affected West Indies Cricket.
As a result, the first item on the reformation agenda to be adopted by Caricom, or any agent functioning under their remit, should be, among other things, to define policy goals, identify policy incentives and create regulation that will allow for the acquisition of those goals. The operations of any organisation that is asked to manage West Indies cricket must be accountable to someone or some overarching body that oversees the broader social and economic model of this region.
In charting the way forward in developing a management model or system for West Indies cricket, a multi-dimensional model must incorporate these concepts and be cognisant that this type of governance therefore implies challenges to traditional forms of the management and politics of sports industries that exist today.
A new model must be inherently flexible in its operations, allowing the organisation to respond to a dynamic and changing global sporting environment that forces the requirement that sports managers must possess a greater range of skills and competencies, if they are to add the value that is expected or them.
West Indies cricket is a viable global brand that reflects the cultural diversity and sporting prowess of people who form part of an integrated chain of Caribbean island states.
This makes it much more than simply a game! Our sporting contribution to the international community is not only sought after, but anticipated and expected.
Individually or collectively, all our islands have made their mark, in some way or the other, on the world stage; and collectively we must continue to do so, even if it is facilitated by a collaborative process that involves our Caribbean leaders.
Arnold Corneal
Maracas Valley, St Joseph