The Brink - Part II | Cricket articles, news, cartoons, statistics

The Brink - Part II

Contributed by Subash Jayaraman

(For Part I of this series, click here)

Every Test has what I call a ‘middle passage’.

It occurs juusst after the game has taken some shape and just before the result has been deemed a foregone conclusion. In a four innings game, spotting this moment becomes an art for the cricketing connoisseur, however, in present circumstances, the passage has popped up early.

Blessed by the whims of the Gods of Calypso Cricket, Dwayne Bravo swashbuckled his way to a fortunate and quick century powering the Windies beyond the run rate at which the Australians are often more comfortable, and, as most observers are well aware, any kinks to their well developed match plans often leads to meltdowns.

The passage shall be the second day's first two sessions. The West Indies must get to 450 and Australia must stop them from doing so. Is that simple mon.

“Federation”

The Mighty Sparrow’s classic composition from the 1960s detailed with great wit the collapse of the West Indian Federation laying the blame (fairly) at Jamaica’s door.

Bravo’s knock has now made it Trinidad 2, Rest of West Indies 0, and again, the snarky separatist bloggers and sports radio shows have made sure to show they have made note. Shall the blame of this second Federation‘s demise be lain on our door in the time to come, I wonder?

“Is There Anybody Out There”

The echo effect utilized by the Floyd all those years ago strikes an apt recollective chord when I note that this so critical series is not being broadcast on radio across the region, and only a deal with the major regional sports cable channel has ensured that be aired on over the air television locally.

The attitude of today’s prospective sponsors speaks volumes as to how West Indian cricket is currently perceived. Not just by the corporate sector, but by the salt-of-the-earth average Joe so essential in determining how the breezes of critical mass taste blows. The team possesses no articulate global star that can stimulate the former group and is clearly (and bizarrely) too individually wealthy and professionally unsuccessful to inspire the latter group.

Where from here? Barring the arrival of another West Indian legend (note how that pipe just drips them out now), relative successes in the short form of the game may well keep a band-aid on the fundamental concerns of talent identification and development, the abrupt arresting of regional cultural corruption, emigration and (again) the extension of a local season efficiently run in three select territories*. Ultimately, with no bold fix implemented, the rot shall seep everywhere and soon we shall all turn away.

*- the WICB has however indicated six territories to host multi-island matches for 2010.

(Click here to know more about Jonathan)

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The Brink - Part II

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