A Tale of Contrasting Fortunes for Darren Sammy.
On the 3rd of April 2016, Darren Sammy, the then captain of the West Indies Cricket team created history, by becoming only the 4th captain in the history of cricket to win more than 1 ICC World Cup. If you look at Darren Sammy’s résumé, it’s quite impressive, to put it subtly He has 2 World T20 wins to his name and is only the 2nd West Indian captain to win a World Cup, let alone 2. He led the nation in what could be termed as the toughest of times. And remarkably enough, the team that played under him was the last competitive enough West Indies team that we saw.
Yet, on Friday, the 5th of August, he was abruptly sacked as the National T20 captain of West Indies and was dropped from the team altogether. While it was abrupt for the rest of the world, in the West Indian circles, it was expected. He was a man determined to prove everyone wrong who thought that winning is not possible during tough times. Carlos Brathwaite, the hero of the 2016 finals, was named the new T20 captain, but that hardly matters. For, it comes at the cost of replacing Darren Sammy and along with it comes the burden of abstracting the past from the present.
Whycliffe Cameron is the current President of the WICB and considered by many as the reason of the ongoing dispute between the board and the players. However, his résumé too, is very contrasting to the actual happenings. He is regarded highly among the business circles and is known for excelling at all sports he takes up. He says and I quote, “My role is here to do business and your role is to play cricket”. He is known to maintain a business-only relationship with the players.
But, then, again, this whole issue reeks of contrast so, why would that be any surprise! If this serves any indication, it is that the West Indies Cricket Board is imploding and the ground zero is the board and its management itself. Now, this isn’t any recent development. It has been going on since a long time. In 2014, Dwayne Bravo’s team cut short the tour of India due to failure of payments to the players from the board. Probably, the phrase “Keep business and friendship separate” holds no weight here.
In the board’s defence, there is plenty of wrong Darren Sammy has done. For firsts, he spoke the truth. His remarks against the board, after the World T20 2016 win was inspirational and direct. He spoke from the heart, and spoke for all the players. He tried taking a stand against the board, which is pretty evidently self-destructing. He won 2 World Cups for the country – Whoa! That’s so wrong. He brought a World Cup to West Indies after 33 years, a feat, which apparently is not praiseworthy enough. If one considers all these wrongdoings of Darren Sammy, the action taken by the WICB is justifiable.
So much for being a captain when no one was ready to. So much for bringing laurels to your country. So much for being right in an environment full of wrongs. Lastly, so much for being an inspiration. After all, not every cricketer has a stadium named after himself. I’d like to end this with a question mark on my face and a quote from my good friend, “It’s stupid this is happening.” Couldn’t agree more brother.
