Gayle, Samuels must be commended
WITH THE West Indies’ securing qualification for the Cricket World Cup, there’s something to lift the spirits. That’s the sight of Chris Gayle and Marlon Samuels wearing the maroon cap into battle once more. For me, it’s a joy that the two big Jamaicans have come to serve the cause.
Believe it or not, t oday’s sportsman plays for money. For generations, the American athlete was rewarded with his or her face on the Wheaties box and an obligatory start to a TV career. In glamour events, an Olympic gold medal is the key to big money in endorsements. Top footballers like Messi and Ronaldo make more than US$60 million per year.
We routinely fuss when our track stars lose when ‘they run for us’ at the World Championships, overlooking the fact that that event offers the biggest pool of prize money i n the sport of athletics.
In that context, Gayle and Samuels are to be complimented. Some of their long time teammates have bypassed the World Cup qualifying tournament for various reasons, and that is their right. The Jamaican pair have shown their loyalty to the cause.
RESULTS ORIENTED
Fans can be very resultsoriented and judge players only in what they deliver on the field of play. The failure of the West Indies batsmen against the Afghanistan spinners is a case in point. It shows an endemic weakness in the way we teach batting. After all, practice makes perfect and bad practice makes you perfectly bad.
That, however, is a matter for the West Indies cricket family to fix with the next generation of players. That group must also be taught the value of tradition and the history of West Indies cricket. Then the hard choices could be made easier for them when the call comes amid other important priorities.
Even in an age where sportsmen, like everyone else, must work for money, reminders come ever so often of how much they love their countries. The t wo things shouldn’t be seen as separate. They have bills to pay too. Gayle and Samuels look like really big men to me. They choose to put on the maroon cap at a time when the West Indies needed help. That’s what family should always do.