ALI BACHER and Clive Lloyd are due to arrive in London from Johannesburg this morning in an attempt to defuse the full-blown crisis that threatens the West Indies' tour of South Africa.
The row between the West Indies players and the Caribbean authorities, now close to a rebellion, could have serious repercussions.
Bacher, managing director of the United Cricket Board of South Africa, and Lloyd, the West Indies tour manager, will today meet a players' delegation, which will include Courtney Walsh, president of the players' association.
The West Indies authorities indicated last night that they were not prepared to back down, though they had been left powerless by the support for Brian Lara and Carl Hooper, who were sacked as captain and vice-captain, withdrawn from the tour and fined on Wednesday for refusing to join the tour party in Johannesburg.
At first, Bacher voiced his 100 per cent support for the Lara-Hooper suspension, saying: ``It is a decision which shows that no individual is greater than the game.''
Since then, he has had to change his approach because cancellation of the tour would do untold damage to the development of cricket and its image in South Africa.
Lara and Hooper, with seven team-mates, have remained in London, their stopping-off point after last week's Bangladesh one-day tournament. Joel Garner, manager of West Indies A on their Pakistan tour, is expected to join the discussions as a mediator.
The remaining seven West Indies players already in South Africa decided yesterday to fly to London, either, according to some reports, as a gesture of support or because they were instructed to by the West Indies board.
Bacher had a meeting with the players in Johannesburg and was given the impression that they wanted the tour to go ahead, but he added: ``I can't lie to anybody. The situation is very serious. The players and the West Indies board have reached an impasse.''
The seven who flew to England were Philo Wallace, Clayton Lambert, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Mervyn Dillon, Nixon McLean, Ridley Jacobs and Stuart Williams.
Last night, Chetram Singh, the Guyana chairman and a West Indies board member, drew up the battle lines when he said: ``Regardless of what happens, there will be no compromise on this. Lara and Hooper will not be going.''
The row has ignited heated opinion in the Caribbean. Alloy Lequay, president of the Trinidad and Tobago board - Lara is a Trinidadian - suggested the dispute might go all the way to the courts. He implied that the West Indies board might have violated ``principles of natural justice''.
Judging from radio phone-ins and public statements, most sympathy was for the players, but Trinidad's Sports Minister, Manohar Ramsaran, spoke up for the authorities when he said: ``A message must be sent, and the board is sending one of discipline.''
Peter Short, the board's immediate past chairman, said: ``I think there is every likelihood now that the players will stand behind Lara and Hooper, in which case it would lead to a total strike of all top players and you are back to virtually the Packer affair.''
He was referring to a previous major revolt, in 1978, when a group of leading players snubbed the West Indies authorities and signed contracts with the circuit organised by the Australian businessman Kerry Packer.
Walsh and the players discussed their next move in a hotel at Heathrow last night. Lara said yesterday: ``The main thing is that the West Indies tour to South Africa should be on. The people want the tour to be on and hopefully something positive will come out of it.
``I am not a member of the West Indies cricket team at the moment, but I would love to be there. My life is playing cricket.''
Lara's grievances on behalf of his players included the lack of payment for attending training and a reduction in playing fees from their tour of Australia, where sponsorship money bolstered their earnings.
In their first major series in South Africa, the West Indians were to earn between £10,000-£37,500 for a three-month tour, involving seven one-dayers and five Tests. England's players, by comparison, will earn upwards of £35,000 on the Ashes tour.
Lara and Hooper declined to fly to Antigua for a disciplinary hearing, to be held at the surprisingly late date of Nov 13. Lesser fines were imposed on the seven other players boycotting the departure to Johannesburg - Walsh, Curtly Ambrose, Jimmy Adams, Junior Murray, Franklyn Rose, Dinath Ramnarine and Daren Ganga.