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IT IS an unfortunate irony that the welcome renaissance in West Indian cricket on the field should have led to a reprise of the crowd disturbances which were once a not uncommon feature of cricket in the Caribbean. The crowd invasion which created an artificial tied match in Guyana last week and the bottle-throwing which interrupted the final game of Australia's tour on Sunday have left the West Indies Cricket Board and the International Cricket Council with an unexpected problem.

It is tempting to say that the passion which lay behind the unruly behaviour was preferable to the apathy which threatened to hasten the apparent decline of the one activity which has ever united the West Indian islands. Brian Lara's personal return to form and the remarkable West Indian recovery against Australia have been wonderful for those already working to regenerate cricket in the Caribbean but the security of players will have to be much better organised.

Steve Waugh's dramatic comment after the invasion in Georgetown that he had feared for his life was brought into sharp focus by the bottle which was thrown dangerously close to his head on Sunday after Sherwin Campbell had been impeded in going for a run by Brendon Julian. The situation would have been defused at once if the umpires had called dead ball, as they could have done under law 42, or if the Australians had shown the same sportsmanship as their former wicketkeeper, Wally Grout, when he refused to run out Fred Titmus in a Test match in the 1960s in not dissimilar circumstances. Chivalry, sadly, no longer comes naturally to professional cricketers.

The only proper ICC reaction now is to refuse the staging of international matches at any ground which cannot satisfy the referee in advance that its security arrangements are reliable.