Just Like It Is – Bad cricket, good politics

Having written on cricket and education last week, I had no intention of returning to cricket this week. When, however, I read that the West Indies selectors were walking with an unchanged 13 for the Second Test at Warner Park, as Chalkdust famously said, “ah put on mih guns again”.West Indies were walloped by South Africa in Port-of-Spain and if we were to have any chance of winning and averting a comprehensive “whitewash” in the 20/20s, 50/50s and Test matches, change had to be high on the agenda. But our selectors opted for the same old, same old; renewal, not change.I say without fear of contradiction that a large part of the problem with our cricket today is the outstanding incompetence of the selectors; and the sooner they are dropped, the better for West Indies cricket.After their performances in the first Test how could Travis Dowling, Ravi Rampaul and Nelon Pascal keep their places? Dowling looked clueless opening the innings, a fact reflected in his scores. Why did the selectors give him preferment over Dale Richards who opened during the shorter version of the game and performed competently with confidence and flair?When I read in the Press days after the end of the 50/50s that he was back at Carlton, I thought it more than passing strange. I ran it by a friend who told me the selectors probably thought at age 32 he was “over the hill”. So you bring in a youngster who looked completely at sea in Port-of-Spain.I always thought the idea was to play your best team, giving yourself a winning chance, especially with humiliation writ large and a whitewash hanging like the sword of Damocles. Rampaul looked unfit, and the few wickets he has taken in the four Tests he has played cost in the mid-70s each. It is alarming that either he or the pedestrian-looking Pascal could get a play before Darren Sammy, who in the earlier games bowled, batted and fielded so well. While I fully appreciate the differing demands of the varying versions of the modern game, I also appreciate that with a dearth of talent, those who demonstrate competence should play – not be shunted aside by the selectors.Furthermore, because the Queen’s Park wicket invariably favours spinners and the two in the side would lengthen the tail, it seemed eminently logical that a quick bowler who could score runs, like Sammy, would have been included. But such layman logic does not inhabit the skulls of genius selectors. And then there are the performances of wicketkeeper Ramdin, which challenge the merit of his continuing selection. Here is a player whose performances trend on a relentless downward slide. They tried a youngster called Andre Fletcher who did not cut it either as a stop-gap keeper or opening batsman. Yet he was rewarded with a place on the A team touring England. Crass mediocrity obviously has its attractions for the selectors who continue to ignore Carlton Baugh who keeps wicket as well as Ramdin, and is a much better batsman.With disenchantment with the state of our cricket rampant across the region, the knives are being sharpened for administrators and players. It would be most fitting if the selectors, major contributors to our cricket’s sorry state, do the decent, patriotic thing and fall on their own swords.Kudos for Kamla  My continuing admiration for Trinidad and Tobago’s new, dynamic Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar has caused some friends to accuse me of suffering from Kamlamania. I liked the way she saw early that if the United National Congress (UNC) was to have a chance of becoming the government, Basdeo Panday would have to be replaced as leader and a rainbow coalition constructed.I liked the way she organised the campaign to replace him, and the root and branch treatment to which she committed to get Ramesh Maharaj, Subhas Panday and Mickala Panday deselected. Subhas, to his eternal credit and unlike Basdeo who threatened unwisely to run against party chairman Jack Warner, kept faith with the party and spoke in the Princes Town riding from which he was deselected.Now the prime minister has reciprocated, appointing him leader of government business in the Senate and minister in the Ministry of National Security, a win-win position which keeps the Panday name, a fixture since 1975 when the UNC was founded, in Parliament, a shrewd, bridge-building move. The other deeply impressive move she made was to follow up the written query from Opposition Leader Keith Rowley querying Jack Warner holding the post of minister of works and transport and being contemporaneously a director of the Federation of the International Football Associations (FIFA).On receipt, she quickly passed it on to the attorney general with instructions to get the best available legal advice on the constitutional and ethical efficacy of Warner holding both posts. Independent opinions were obtained from legal luminary and former president Sir Ellis Clarke, former attorney general Russell Martineau, regional legal icon Dr Fenton Ramsahoye and British QC Michael Beloff.There was consensus among these legal titans that there was nothing in the Trinidad and Tobago Constitution preventing Warner from holding both jobs; there was no illegality and no conflict of interest.The alacrity and thoroughness with which the prime minister addressed and resolved this issue was a refreshing object lesson for fellow Caribbean leaders who too often prefer to shy away from what they consider contentious issues. The country’s first female leader is off to an auspicious start.     • Peter Simmons, a social scientist, is a former diplomat.