Everythime discussion took place about bringing back the former era of West Indies dominance, Joel Garner, Curtly Ambrose and Shiv Chanderpaul discussed this topic to bring in the West Indies back to their former glory. The most one-sided World Cup was considered for the year 1979. West Indies were gradually progressing to win the trophy, but in the way, they had to compete against Sri Lanka. West Indies lost against Sri Lanka in the group stage, although they have won over 92 runs against England in the final is one of the great examples of their dominance.
In this competition, Gordon Greenidge was the top scorer with 253 runs, and second place in the list of a top scorer with 217 runs was Viv Richards. As for the legendary 6 ft 8 in fast bowler, he enjoyed the cricket the played in the tournament. This was one of the best performances of him, where he took 8 wickets out of 146 ODI wickets in this tournament. We also added that they gave their best performance in the tournament while supporting each other which really, we give them a better chance.
West Indies is one of the top contenders in the 2019 World Cup to win the competition. Although West Indies was one of the most respected teams throughout the 1980s and 1990s, this is because after Viv Richards presented the team to Richie Richardson. In this era, there are several Brazilian players like Brian Lara, Shiv Chanderpaul, Courtney Walsh and Curtly Ambrose. The possible dominance was made by the West Indies team due to their perfect combination along with skill and aura.
In the History of cricket, we will remember them as one of the most feared and fabled team. So, it is difficult to understand how the West Indies cricket team suffering nowadays even though they are one of the most dominating teams in cricket. Curtly Ambrose took 630 international wickets between 1988 to 2000 and has 24 wickets in the world cup, things that the current West Indies team makes sad how the dominance was lowered. According to him, there was a time, West Indies team was considered number one in the world and every cricket team once beat them in the tournament. After the degradation of their quality of cricket in the West Indies team, it is hard to grasp the current condition. Along the way, West Indies also got a player named Nadir Khan at the end of the decade, although they have only won 2 test matches out of 33 test matches between February 2009 to July 2012.
They even failed to qualify for the champions trophy 2017 due to their off form, they were eliminated by the ranking system of the teams. Ambrose thinks that none of the team can dominate the world forever and there will always be a bad performance which will make the team decline into the lower rankings. This happens because, after a few years most of the players will retire from their team and it is difficult to find a replacement. As there is currently no better replacement who can replace Clive Lloyd, Viv Richards, Brian Lara, or even Malcolm Marshall.
Although according to an interview at Betway, the West Indies cricket team is taking too much time to bounce back to their former Glory. Currently, West Indies is having enough talent in the team who can get the cricket team to the top 3 of the world ranking. 2016 was a glorious year for the West Indies team because Daren Sammy let the team achieve the title of World T20. This is one of the best examples of the West Indies and reminding other teams that they can also compete against the top contenders and win the tournament.
CWI is now interested in making professional domestic cricket setup for the last 6 years, they also providing incentives to several youngsters in order to encourage them to take cricket as a full-time career. CWI is not willing to make a similar mistake which is the main reason for the declining ranking of the team. After the introduction of the CPL, the popularity grew. It is basically a Caribbean franchise T20 tournament, which is similar to most of the countries organizing T20 tournaments. It is one of the good opportunities to bring new talents to the team which can lead to a good amount of success for the West Indies if used properly.
According to Garner, T20 cricket tournaments meant for the profit of the consumers and the people who are running the tournament. But it is one of the major points to keep in mind that, the money from the tournament must go back to the cricket itself. So, it is suggested to invest money from the Grass root levels, which will be good for the future of cricket. Because this tournament will bring the next generation cricketers with wonderful talents. Shiv Chanderpaul is confident that the administration of the West Indies has identified the issue and they are ready for recovering back to their position. We also so said that they had to do everything with their own income and they are having no contracts with the cricket board.
They will have to arrange their own travel with their own money, which was basically organized by the West Indies cricket board. But currently, all the countries in the Caribbean are having a contract, so this confirms that the players will be playing in regional tournaments. West Indies has recovered, the improvement is showing by the 2-1 victory against England in the test series of 3 matches. They also had a 2-2 draw with the number one team in the ODI series. Currently, West Indies is an underdog team in the world cup, but they are still considered as dark horses that may recover their position.
The only issue about their current team is that there are several inexperienced players like Shai Hope and Shimron Hetmyer but they are having the potential. There are several players who are aged 30 or 31, but they haven’t played in an international match compared to their age. Darren Bravo, Kemar, and Shannon Gabriel are the players who are having a similar inexperience issue. Previously several senior players are available in the team who were trained and nurture the new arrivals with experience and skills.
Currently, the England cricket board has appointed Mark Ramprakash and Graeme Thorpe as batting consultants, this is much needed for the West Indies cricket team. There are several experienced players available in the Caribbean, who need to lend their experience to all the new and young players for a better understanding of cricket and competing at the international level. As the West Indies team is currently in the right direction, according to Chanderpaul World Cup heroic winners of 1979 will soon be repeated. This is a clear possibility which most of the former West Indies players can see in their new team.
You can read more about the West Indies superstars on Betway’s Insider.
