Shopping at Whitsuntide can be a nightmare, especially if you dare to dream about packing your bags with memorabilia to assist the West Indies cricket team.
Just imagine that Chris Gayle, Dwayne Bravo, Andre Russell and Sunil Narine had joined their West Indian teammates for the upcoming One-Day series against England and were on a shopping spree at one of those massive malls in England, spending some of their Indian Premier League (IPL) cash on souvenirs.
Not wanting to be in the same position as Narsingh Deonarine and Assad Fudadin, they had moved swiftly to secure the necessary visas and arrived early from India to get acclimatized to the English conditions even though the selectors were again tardy in announcing the squad for the limited-overs section of the tour.
Cognizant that this current crop of Caribbean cricketers love to read about the history of cricket, and since England is an excellent place for purchasing cricket books and magazines, they went into the book section.
The shelves were naturally packed with books ranging from autobiographies to coaching manuals.
At the top of the list was a Geoffrey Boycott masterpiece: Batting Technique For Test Cricket. This was a must-buy for the West Indies’ openers Kieran Powell and Adrian Barath and top-order duo Kirk Edwards and Darren Bravo.
But next to this book was one called Durable Duo, with an introduction by Gordon Greenidge on Mastering Swing Bowling and a foreword by Desmond Haynes on The Art Of Batting In English Conditions.
There was an interesting chapter in which another West Indian Seymour Nurse suggested that batsmen should attend dancing classes, where they would be taught the art of getting in line, moving their feet and going back and across.
Gayle, always one to do his own thing, summoned the store manager and informed him that he would be offering for sale an alternative coaching manual, called The Stand And Deliver Method, a guide for T20, Test cricket and triple tons.
Facetiously, Dwayne Bravo asked the sales clerk whether there was any book by new West Indies assistant coach Tony Radford. The shocking response was that the store only stocked the best books on the art of batsmanship from cricketing greats.
It wasn’t surprising that Bravo quickly moved away from the book section and walked towards the music store to get a few CDs.
Unbelievably, the first one he saw wasn’t Calypso Collapso Cricketers but was entitled Keep On Smiling Sammy.
The picture of the embattled West Indies captain on the cover wasn’t one with a look of disappointment or dejection – and who could fault him as he now had 100 reasons to be happy after his maiden Test century and was even promising no more cavalier cameos, but that he would be concentrating for more centuries.
The CD was a remake of the song Keep On Doing What You Are Doing Sammy with new lyrics: “Don’t let defeat get you down; Success is coming maybe someday; The team will come around; Just wait till next year; Keep on smiling, Sammy; Whenever West Indies lose, keep your cool; West Indians still happy, ’cause Chris Gayle lose too.”
Back in the book section, Russell said he wanted to get a memento for his Jamaican compatriot Marlon Samuels for his changed attitude and was thus purchasing a memoir which Gayle had recommended – To Be Cool, Consistent And Committed.
He also took up Michael Holding’s autobiography for fast bowler Kemar Roach on Wasting Wickets With No-balls.
Not to be left out, Narine said he wanted something for fellow off-spinner Shane Shillingford, but the dusty Windsor Park pitch in Dominica was too big to fit into his haversack.
He also felt that it was imperative to buy Jeffrey Dujon’s book How To Keep Wicket And Make Runs for his Trinidadian countryman Denesh Ramdin and carried copies for Carlton Baugh and the other young wicketkeepers in the Caribbean, like “A” Team selectee Devon Thomas.
But just as they were packing away their souvenirs, the cashier said that he wanted to make a presentation to Gayle on behalf of the store for being such good customers. It was a brand new publication: Ottis Gibson’s Way.
Like me, Gayle realized it was just a dream and opened his eyes to the fantasy world of West Indies cricket.
