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Sir Vivian Richards and Richie Richardson, two of Antigua’s most famous sons, have strong views about cricket, both in the Caribbean and the world at large. Wouldn’t it be great to eavesdrop on what these great friends have to say about our national game? ZiNG sent Geoffrey Dean in to do just that…
Q You have both been at the top of the game and are well placed to comment on the state of West Indian cricket at the moment, but can we begin by talking about your views on the younger players coming through at the moment? RR I have never had a problem with the talent we produce. I know that cricket is embedded in our genes and we will continue to produce the talent. The problem is the system with West Indies cricket – the players are not going to be able to realise their full potential. Although cricket in the Caribbean is really, really weak right now, I still think we’ve got some good players coming through. We need to get the structure right, get our cricket strong regionally with proper coaching, youth development, stuff like that. If a young player makes it from, say, Nevis, when he gets to the West Indies team, the coach should know a helluva lot about this guy. A lot of times, these youngsters make it to the national team and it’s as if they haven’t learnt anything because they have been coached differently. Every island does something slightly different. You need one system that goes right through the entire West Indies and its grass roots cricket. Not a coach from Australia who doesn’t know anything about players in Anguilla – it shouldn’t be like that. The person at the top must know exactly what goes right down. GD Viv, you’ve been captain, coach and chairman of selectors and are well placed to know what changes must be made to the structure of West Indies cricket. VR I support Richie to a degree about the changes needed. You must have people you respect at the top. That’s why you’re seeing a tug-of-war going on presently with players, players’ association representatives and members of the Board. Certain things haven’t been addressed at the top where leadership matters are concerned. There is a truce at the moment but, at some point, someone is going to start the fire again. Q Do you believe that the many issues of disagreement between the West Indies Cricket Board and the West Indies players, which culminated in last year’s damaging strike by the latter, have been fully resolved? VR I’m not sure to what extent the strike’s been resolved. It looks good at the moment but you would have had a war, and to stop that, a truce. Despite the truce, I believe that at some point the war’s going to start again – that’s the sad part about it. RR The board didn’t fulfill a lot of promises, and there were outstanding monies the players weren’t getting over a long period, and they just decided enough was enough. That’s from one side – I never heard the Board’s side. Q Would it be fair to say you had strained relations with the Board when you were both captain? RR There were always problems with the Board. I got the impression there was always a rift – the Board was on one side and we were on the other. For some reason, we always felt they looked down on us, that they thought we were just there to play and that we couldn’t contribute to West Indies cricket in any other way. Quite often, we had ideas, wanting to do something about our cricket as we were very concerned about it and saw the way it was going, but they never listened to us. At some of our meetings together, we got the impression the notes and the minutes taken were thrown into a bin afterwards. So as far as I’m concerned, there was never ever a really good relationship between us and the Board. VR Let me just add a little bit to that. Having known the problems on both sides, you cannot accuse one without the other. Richie’s so right, but there are always two sides to a particular story. If the Board couldn’t set things right at this stage, it’s always very important you have your players’ association. I think the players definitely need some representation. I guess in the present day, the Board would have let a lot of people down in the same way they did many years in the past. In order for West Indies cricket to move on, there are some personalities that are presently holding things up. I won’t mention the names but I think readers will have a fair idea of exactly who we’re speaking about. They should do the manly stuff and say, ‘we’ve taken it so far, let us get somebody fresh.’ What amazes me is the Board can hire and fire but that there isn’t a body to put it on trial. I’m hearing there was some stuff that went on for Ernest Hilaire to be on board as CEO – apparently it wasn’t a democratic election. It’s also alleged that he came in because the Board President is a Lucian like him. The personalities presently involved must vacate the scene so that more moderate people can take this up and move forward. The folks who caused all this damage are still around. That I find hard. We’ve all heard about the Patterson Report, but we haven’t seen anything done seriously to eradicate some of the stuff in it. I spoke to Mr Patterson personally, and there are so many things that the Board are not capable of doing. So it’s like that old song, Play It Again Sam: it comes back to haunt you. RR My question is this. Who does the West Indies Cricket Board answer to? Are they a Board that can just do whatever they feel like without answering to the people or governments of the Caribbean? You cannot have an organisation that’s been in control for so long and think they’re doing just fine. Basically the same people are there – I’ve nothing personal against the individuals, but what I have a problem with is the whole system of the board, and I believe they have to answer to somebody. The governments of the region have to take control, dismantle the present West Indies Cricket Board, look for five corporations or business people in the Caribbean who have proven to the populations of the Caribbean that they are capable of running a business properly and profitably. Then, let them run West Indies cricket for at least ten or fifteen years, let them appoint people who they know can do the job and run it like a business. Forget about the politics of inter-island relationships, forget about friends and company. I think that if that is done, it could help to restore our cricket. It’s the only way at this point we can move forward with West Indies cricket. Q Can I come on to Allen Stanford and your thoughts on his affect on the game in the Caribbean? RR First of all, I think it’s an unfortunate situation. It looked good at the time and I certainly supported Stanford Twenty20 cricket. I believe it had started to make a difference to West Indies cricket. When you walked around town, you saw young kids – boys and even girls – playing cricket in backyards and the streets. That’s what we want in the Caribbean. Young people saw something they wanted to be a part of, and it was exciting. The players had an opportunity to make a living. A couple of teams had become professionalised, they were playing cricket every day and you saw the difference. But unfortunately, we all know what happened, and it’s a sad situation. VR Let me say that before all this stuff unfolded, Allen Stanford made a huge difference to our cricket. I felt the Caribbean did benefit a lot – the excitement the whole Twenty20 brought to the region. It was a wonderful period.” Q Do you think you’ve lost fast bowlers to other sports like basketball, baseball and soccer, or is that over-stated? VR I have never believed we had a problem in that respect. It’s a myth in my opinion. I just don’t think we’ve kept the fire burning long enough since the days of our success. RR I’d like to support Viv on that. I think it’s an excuse. It is a fact that we are exposed to a lot of American sport on TV, but really and truly, we’re not doing our job properly. What we need to do is promote our sport more and remind the youngsters of the great names of the past. If I turn on my local station in Antigua, I’ll never see a video of Viv or Garfield Sobers or Andy Roberts. If I keep trawling through, I might come to an Indian channel and see Ian Botham bowling to Viv. We don’t have enough education programmes within our schools to let the youngsters know where we came from. The Board, the local boards and the governments really need to take that responsibility and promote the history of West Indies cricket, especially in the schools. VR I think you’ve got to make the environment right for the kids. I can remember when my son, Mali, started playing for the Leewards’ youth team, they used to go on tour, away from home, and the living conditions were just horrible. They soon become disillusioned. It is not enjoyable for them, and sooner or later, you’ll have them turn to something else. But those youngsters should be taken care of, be given special treatment and taught our cricketing history. Some young West Indians have hardly any knowledge of what West Indian cricket really represents. For you to play for West Indies, you should have to take some sort of exam like you do for citizenship for Australia where you must at least know who Don Bradman and these folk are. If you’re going to play for the West Indies, you have to have a good understanding of the history of the sport itself. I took that on board – there is a legacy I represent and it held me in good stead. I believe that most of the modern-day players don’t quite understand what that means. RR I can tell you a story where that is concerned. A few years ago, Merv Dillon, who was playing for West Indies at the time, was flying to Jamaica. He sat beside Sir Everton Weekes and didn’t even know who he was, to the point where Sir Everton was a little bit embarrassed. He was one of our icons, one of the legends, and you’re talking about a young player for the West Indies who didn’t even know about him. It’s not Dillon’s fault, it’s our fault. Because we don’t project our heroes enough to these young players for them to know what they’ve done and to aspire to be like them. When I looked at Dillon in the field, I thought, ‘he’s big, but there’s something missing.’ If he knew what it was like when Roberts, Holding, Marshall and Co. were playing, he would have shown a different approach and come across as meaner. All these things contribute to our downfall. Q What are you both up to these days? RR All my life, I played sport and enjoyed it, and I want to continue doing that. Basically what I’m doing is sports tourism – fun stuff I mean. Invite people to come and play golf or beach cricket or soccer with me. Have a drink at my home and a little lime. Possibly have a drink with Viv too. I think that sports tourism is very important to Antigua. Then, there’s my band that I play in. VR I’m very much involved with my foundation, which I’m passionate about. I’m hoping to make it much bigger to ensure I can make a contribution. It doesn’t have to be in sport itself – anyone who’s shown talent in education or whatever: the foundation will be there to help, especially bright kids from poor backgrounds. It’s always been one of my aims to give something back. If Johnnie Walker’s going to come on board, we’re hoping to do something much more regional where we can be involved in more islands than just one or two. I also love my golf, and try and get out on the course as much as possible. I believe 57 is still a very young age and there’s lots of time to accomplish some of my dreams. My one for retirement is the Viv Richards Complex in Willoughby Bay in the south of Antigua, where we planned to build 12 villas before the financiers went bust. We’ll need to do more now. Q Are you doing any coaching in the Caribbean, Viv? VR I like to look at myself as an adviser. They say you must have a coaching badge, but I’d like to think the coaching badge I bring is my twentysomething years in the game, being a successful captain of the West Indies team. My foundation has given schools in Antigua the kits to play and I’m hoping to spend much more time in the future helping out some of the younger folks in my region. RR I’ll always be involved in youth develop-ment. From time to time at home, I’ll go to various schools, and take cricket videos of Viv, Ambrose and Roberts to show them to the kids; we do ‘Q &A’ sessions and some motivational talks. I’m also involved with a cricket scholarship where I get sponsorship for young kids to go over and play cricket at schools in England. We’ve had four candidates so far, including Robbie Joseph who now plays for Kent. Q Looking back, what do you miss about your playing days? VR What I miss more than anything is the friendly environment you live in. It’s a great place to be – I miss the friendship, the camaraderie, the people who’ve made such a magnificent contribution to the game itself. I wouldn’t say I miss the competitive side of things as that’s a one-off situation, but I do miss the individuals and team-mates. RR Much the same for me. When I first joined the West Indies team, I couldn’t believe it, being with all these great stars. Then quickly I realised I had to get my feet on the ground and work really hard. Playing hard, competing, performing: that’s only going to last for a certain length of time. You know that. For me, the greatest thing was being part of that unique setup. I wish the rest of the Caribbean really knew the inside story because I thought we were a great example of what unity is all about. If we had that within the Caribbean generally, the Caribbean would be a much better place. I think that the current players have a different approach – I could be wrong but the impression I get is that they don’t enjoy the cricket as much. The focus seems mainly to be on being compensated, being paid. We had times when we were not paid, but all we wanted to do was go out there and play for West Indies, play hard and win. And once you win, everything else falls into place. Many times when we were selected, we didn’t know what, if and how much we were going to be paid. VR We had our run-ins with the Board but for some reason, they were settled in a much different way than they are today. I feel these are some of the things that have caused a lot of folks to become a little disenchanted with the direction West Indies cricket is heading. I hope that changes. RR The focus of the youngsters is on more materialistic things - the bling, the style, the fashion - and hard work seems to be secondary. When we played, the standards in the West Indies side were so high. If you put on an ounce of fat, Dennis Waight, the physio, would get on your case and you’d be criticised by Viv or whoever. You had to be up there. I mean even the way you dressed, not necessarily in flashy stuff, but you had to be smart, colour-coordinated. Even the women you spoke to had to be of a certain standard. Now, certain guys seem not to go that extra mile in terms of the hard work outside of when you train. Even though there are more coaches, statisticians, dieticians and doctors, the players don’t seem to have the discipline to fit into that kind of routine. Or maybe they don’t want to. VR Discipline and hard work breeds success. The things that breed success are pretty much lacking at the moment. We would have had our disagreements with team-mates, but from the moment we got out onto the park they were behind us. I guess that now there are still some who are taking their baggage from off the field onto it. The whole thing needs to change. |
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