IN FOCUS
Region Achieves Cricket Success When We Come Together as a People by Carol Williams
In a sobering assessment of West Indies cricket, Barbadian Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley has called for urgent action to address inequalities and improve the overall standard of the game. Her delivery of the 22nd Annual Frank Worrell Memorial Lecture on 25 July 2023 was much anticipated as the event coincided with the continued inconsistent performance of the regional side.
W ith cricket administrators, regional and international cricketers, cricket enthusiasts and others listening keenly as part of the in-person audience attending the event at the Cave Hill campus, the Barbadian leader pulled no punches, yet steered clear of finger-pointing. She addressed four main issues in her lecture on the topic “ Cricket Lovely Cricket – It Is More than Bat and Ball !” She said the unequal playing field for West Indies Women cricketers, governance, the deteriorating structure of cricketing clubs and associations, and ownership were germane to being successful in international matches and to stoke continued interest among West Indians. Furthermore, she insisted the region needed to get its act together and set aside insularity and fragmentation since cricket played a key part in Caribbean civilisation. “Thirty-one years after the Governance Report of 1992, then the Patterson Report in 2007, the Wilkins Report of 2012, and the previous principal’s report, the Most Honourable [Professor] Eudine Barriteau of 2015, and the reviews that were ordered in between
… and finally, the most exceptionally encapsulated in the Wehby Report , we continue to believe that we can rewrite the future of cricket in the Caribbean by an approach of fragmentation rather than cohesion; by insularity rather than unity. “At every stage of the game, we have been battling with the status quo … The bottom line is that we have reached a point where the absolute imperative must be to change the governance of our game. New Zealand understood it, and it took them a while too as, one may argue, one of those Commonwealth countries that paid obeisance to Her Majesty at the time. In 1995, they had a report, but it wasn’t until many years later that they were able to move from that position.” The regional leader said the sport is so revered in India that the country’s Supreme Court declared cricket a public good some years ago. However, as she noted such action was unlikely in the Caribbean since the Privy Council remained the highest court for some states while the Caribbean Court of Justice was for others. Beyond these issues, the Prime Minister spoke at length about discriminatory practices against West Indies Women cricketers,
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