Inadvertently, I may have started up a great hornet's nest with a very innocent interview, done two days before the start of the second Test between New Zealand and West Indies at Wellington, with the present West Indian team manager, Clive Lloyd. In that interview, I asked Lloyd if he would be applying for the position of West Indian senior team manager, the criteria for which have only very recently been published in the Caribbean by the West Indies Cricket Board. Indeed, I have received calls, e-mails and everything else for comments on this.

Lloyd's reply was simply this: "I do not think so. I think that I have given my all over the last few years to try to make this team better. However, I think that whomsoever takes over this team would not be taking over a bad team. We have worked on a few things over the last few years and these guys are now getting there, slowly. We now have a few fairly good openers, and a regular wicket-keeper. The fast bowlers are not bad but our middle order batting still needs to be consistent and a bit more tough."

One could detect, if one looked closely, that Lloyd is sorely disappointed, perhaps even sad, that his tenure as Manager did not become more successful. However, as one friend told me, "The best race car driver in the world could not bring home a winner in a Grand Prix if the car was not built, serviced and tested properly."

Clive Lloyd's problem, in my mind, is that he took a position and tried to change it from the inside. In my opinion, he should have asked for the responsibilities of his position to be spelled out before he took the position. He would then have had the option of accepting or not. One cannot accept a position using one criteria and then hope to change that criteria once the position is accepted.

Somehow, that reply of Lloyd's has been badly misconstrued as to suggest that "Clive Lloyd is stepping down as manager of the West Indies cricket team." That really makes no sense at all, since one could only step down from a position that one actually "holds." To explain that, some important history is necessary here.

Clive Lloyd was appointed as Manager (his second stint) of the senior West Indies cricket team, on a three year contract, some time in 1996 after Wes Hall, the then Manager, decided that he had to go unto better, or at least, different things. Lloyd's contract actually ended last October (1999). Clive Lloyd was then asked by the West Indies Cricket Board, after the plethora of one day games played between May and October last, to continue in the position, for this New Zealand tour ONLY.

This was to facilitate the WICB to put things into place and appoint a new Manager for the new Millenium, starting with the Pakistan and Zimbabwe series in the Caribbean early 2000. In effect, Clive Lloyd in New Zealand is not unlike present US President, Bill Clinton; a "lame duck" or "care- taker" manager. Normally, a "lame duck" anybody gets nothing done, as there is no need to get anything done. Simply, it is a waste of time!!

A passing note should also indicate that the team's present Coach, (Sir) Vivian Richards, was also appointed ONLY for this short tour of New Zealand. For him to continue as Coach, Viv too will have to apply, like everyone else aspiring to the position, and be considered likewise. However, a quick glance of the advertised requirements, as published by the WICB, for the position of Coach of the senior West Indies cricket team, would indicate that, very obviously, Viv Richards does NOT qualify. In effect, he too is a "lame duck" Coach!!

Despite the fact that Viv has some eight and a half thousand Test runs, and is still the only West Indian captain not to have lost a Test series ever, after being captain for about six years, it is unbelievable, but true, that Viv does not qualify. To qualify to be the West Indies senior team Coach, as stated by the WICB, an applicant must have at least (a) a Senior Coaching Certificate, as issued by either the MCC or the WICB etc., and (b) at least two years of continuing experience in a similar position as a cricket coach. Viv Richards has neither of these qualifications.

Viv is NOT a certified cricket coach and he has only been the team's coach for a short period during the last cricket World Cup and now to New Zealand. He has suggested that "I intend to apply for this position. Six weeks (the New Zealand tour) is certainly not enough time to whip this team into the shape I would like, as I want to implement a few things. I have not even scratched the surface yet."

There is something badly wrong here. Perhaps questions should be asked of the West Indies Cricket Board. Among them would be the obvious one. "Why was Lloyd's contract allowed to run down and end before the vacant position was even advertised, much less filled?". As things are, no-one will even be interviewed before the new Millenium, since the closing date of the vacancy notice for this senior team Manager position is around the middle of January next. The West Indies Cricket Board, in my mind, has been very slow on the uptake in getting things done here. Surely they should have known that Lloyd's contract would have expired in October, since he had a contract with them. The WICB should have advertised for this position some time in July last, just after the World Cup ended. By now, someone might have been identified and might even have been employed.

Unfortunately for Lloyd, in a sense, he is caught up in a sequence, now, that he cannot control. Personally, I thought, and actually said so, that he should have been fired, along with Malcolm Marshall, after the South African debacle. From what I could see and sense while covering that South African tour, no leadership was provided by these two at all during that trip, leadership which was dearly needed after the second Test match at Port Elizabeth. Had the right things been done there and then, as any American sports entity would have done, the West Indies, and Clive Lloyd, would not have been in this continuing mess.

Mis-information is a terrible thing, especially going into the new Millenium. For this senior West Indies cricket team management situation, it has been so poor that even former West Indian players are suggesting, only now, that perhaps Lloyd should step down as Manager. Lloyd cannot step down from a position which he does not, in fact, "hold". He is now in a "care-taker" position, until someone else is appointed. He knows that and so does the WICB. Whenever a new Manager is selected and appointed, as should have been done, at the latest, by October last, Clive Lloyd would probably go on his merry way, having put all he could into West Indian cricket, both as a player and as a manager.

© 1999