Why does cricket need a strong West Indies?

[Langeveldt]

It really gets my goat when I hear this being uttered by former players or commentators..

Fact of the matter is, all sports rely on balances in power changing.. We now have a dominant Australia, South Africa re-admitted, Bangladesh starting to show glimpses of progression, and other nations such as Ireland and Nepal starting to get noticed.. All this at the expense, probably of the West Indies past dominance, but some people seem to lament this, as if the West Indies have a right to a place near the top of world cricket.. I can't understand why there is anything inherantly wrong with them being near the bottom of the tree.. It's obviously sad for their followers to see their regression, but I don't see why it's sad for cricket..

 

[Perm]

The same reason we need a strong India and a strong Australia. The fan followng in those three countries is amazing, especially when their team is winning. This is true even more in the West Indies, with their passion and love of cricket and ability to turn the 5 days of a Test or 6 hours of an ODI into a great spectacle, even if the game is less than entertaining.

Personally I find the decline of West Indian cricket incredibly sad, considering how much of a force they were 20-30 years ago. To decline so rapidly isn't fair on the general cricketing public IMO, and this would be the case with any country. Imagine the sorrow that people (other than Fiery ) would feel if in 2027 Australia were struggling to remain competitive in international cricket.

 

[Langeveldt]

I wouldn't feel any sorrow if Australia couldn't remain competitive in 2027.. Because we could have another amazingly strong team to enjoy,, Swings and roundabouts

 

[Jono]

Because they have a distinct cricketing culture, compared to differences between India, Pak and SL or Aus, NZ and Eng etc. Hence its good for cricket if they are at the very least, continously competitive.

 

[Perm]

I wouldn't feel any sorrow if Australia couldn't remain competitive in 2027.. Because we could have another amazingly strong team to enjoy,, Swings and roundabouts

You are a heartless beast IMO.

The whole joy of watching cricket is the competition for me. Obviously I enjoy some of the fine players and teams on display in this day and age, but if there is one thing I yearn for it would be that teams like Bangladesh, New Zealand and the West Indies all be competitive in both Test and ODI cricket. This would increase the standard of cricket so much and also provide a greater spectacle for cricket lovers around the world, as well as being more exciting for the players.

 

[Dasa]

I don't think cricket needs a strong West Indies. It'd be cool if they were strong though. Expanding on that a bit, it's good for cricket if all the teams are competitive to a degree and as such, the Windies being as weak as they are right now doesn't make for good cricket....but I don't think cricket needs a strong West Indies any more than it needs a strong Australia or a strong New Zealand etc.

 

[Manee]

Cricket is dying in the West Indies because they are a terrible team and the increasing appeal of footballers such as Dwight Yorke going into the big leagues in the Premiership while the stars of yesteryear have all retired. The West Indian veterans want the sport they love to be reinstituted as the main and favourite sport in the West Indies.

Fast bowling is 'cool' and the big muscular West Indians have all the physical attributes to produce many but they have hit a brown patch of lack of talent and this will snowball into a lack of interest and soon there will be no quality coming out of the West Indies.

With the exception of India in India, no team since the West Indies of the 1980s have competed against Australia in something other than a one sided affair. Even better, it was not through coaching or technique, just through running in and bowling quick and hitting the ball hard by the batsman, something the kids of the time could relate to.

The veterans of West Indies just want to be remembered as pioneers of West Indian cricket rather than artists practising a dying art.

 

[Burgey]

Agree with Perm & Jono here - a strong WI will propagate the great characters and distinct fan-base of that region and make for more competitive cricket all round.

We hear the comment at issue about different sides whenever they are meh, tbh. I recall hearing it in the 80s re Australia, and every year between 1989-2003 re. England. And again now

Maybe it's because we kind of feel bad about beating up on a certain side over a prolonged period.

I know people will say that WI showed us no mercy when they were great, as they will say about Australia when their golden run ends, but that only goes so far.

After a while you look back through rose-coloured glasses at the talents of the former greats from the now weakened country and long for a return to the days when the competitive juices flowed when your side fronted up to them.

As you get older you think to yourself "Wonder if McGrath could get away with that dry line stuff if Gordon & Dezzie were opening?" "Wonder how Warney would have bowled to Viv?" "Wonder how Punter would have gone playing those pull shots vs Marshall" etc etc.

And often, you do it, sadly, because what's on offer at the time you're really watching just isn't much chop.

 

[Goughy]

Im with you Rich. The WI could fall into the sea in cricketing terms as far as Im concerned.

Its international competition not the girl scouts cooking contest. WI are rubbish because they have poor players and poor administration and deserve to be poor. Its great after years of getting beat by them. Just hoping Aus goes the same way

 

[honestbharani]

Im with you Rich. The WI could fall into the sea in cricketing terms as far as Im concerned.

Its international competition not the girl scouts cooking contest. WI are rubbish because they have poor players and poor administration and deserve to be poor. Its great after years of getting beat by them. Just hoping Aus goes the same way

so its actually more important to u that that the dominant teams that beat ur team go down the drain than ur team becoming as dominant as them?

 

[Perm]

Im with you Rich. The WI could fall into the sea in cricketing terms as far as Im concerned.

Its international competition not the girl scouts cooking contest. WI are rubbish because they have poor players and poor administration and deserve to be poor. Its great after years of getting beat by them. Just hoping Aus goes the same way

Wouldn't you rather have more competition than a team being continually pummeled?

 

[Goughy]

Wouldn't you rather have more competition than a team being continually pummeled?

Im asking for more competition with other nations taking over from previously dominant ones.

 

[Perm]

Im asking for more competition with other nations taking over from previously dominant ones.

I fail to see how that is preferrably to having one dominant team (in this case Australia) and the other 8 countries all being competitive with one another.

 

[honestbharani]

I think the essence of this argument here is what one means by the word "strong". If it means a reasonably competitive Windies side, sure, the game would really gain by having a decent windies side, because of the fact that both their players and their fans bring in something unique to this game and that is always an enriching experience. But if it means a dominant team like the 80s, not sure if cricket needs another of those.

 

[Poker Boy]

Cricket needs a good England, Australia, SA, India and Pakistan too - for the same reason they need a good Windies - when there are few top sides in a sport it suffers if one of them is weak. The other thing is as an outsider, this feels worse than either Australia in the 1980's (remember Chappell, Lillee and Marsh retired all together and then they lost a lot of good players down the SA plughole) or England in the 1990's (England had the talent then but underachieved because of a poor system. The away wins in Pakistan and SL in 2000/01 with a lot of the players who underachived in the 1990's proves that). Whereas with the Windies because of the fear that youngsters prefer football and basketball it seems to me this could be terminal. And the horrific thought is that last week they were so far behind a team the Aussies had whitewashed last winter - imagine this current Windies team playing last winter's Aussies..scary.

 

[Goughy]

Well the proof of the pudding etc, the WI have not been strong for a while now and World cricket (though some may disagree) is at its strongest in terms of finances and standards since the 1950s.

Cricket doesnt need a strong West Indies. Maybe West Indies cricket does but International cricket doesn't.

 

[Manee]

I can understand why the veterans want a stront West Indies (see my last post) but yes, a weak West Indies is not doing any major harm to cricket in the World.

 

[silentstriker]

I don't know about need, but the more competition the better.

 

[PhoenixFire]

I think that it is also a blame on the pitches part.

The West-Indian pitches are following a general trend of slow and low bounce, which doesn't encourage the fast bowling that made the West Indies famous. It might seem like a bit inconsequential, but I'm sure it has something to do with it.

 

[Richard]

West Indies was always best when you had the fast, bouncy pitches at Sabina Park and Kensington Oval (look at how long they were unbeaten at those grounds for - it's incredible) in addition to the slower ones at Bourda and Queen's Park Oval, and the featherbeds at Antigua. That's one of a multitude of things that'd help to improve.