Holder’s ban casts gloom over Windies Test series

● Jason Holder should be scooping up the chi. Instead he’s been reduced to accepting his praise in the second prize surrounds of a plush box filled with suits.

Holder deserves to be out there doffing his cap to the crowd in Saint Lucia, enjoying the adulation he earned by leading West Indies to stirring victories in the first two matches of their Test series against England.

If there’s any use for a dead rubber, which is what the third Test is and thus it should have been cancelled, it has to be to give victorious teams the opportunity to bask in the glory they garnered when winning still mattered.

Or, as a man who was billed as a qigong master told about a dozen of us to do as we stood in a pristine river gorge in the Overberg a while ago, “Scoop up the chi …”

Chi is “material energy”, “life force” or “energy flow”. Followers of the ancient Chinese practice of tai chi consider it a “vital energy”.

All good. Welcome to the world, and all that. But, have to say, I neither saw, smelt, tasted, heard nor indeed felt any chi, try as I might to scoop it up from the air around me. And not that I would know what the hell chi looked, smelt, tasted, heard or felt like.

But, hey, it didn’t hurt and though odd it was also fun, and maybe some of us did latch onto a handful of the stuff as they kept an eye out for passing unicorns.

Not so Holder’s absence from the field, which hurts Test cricket when it can least afford it and takes the fun out of an occasion that should be awash with happiness.

What stinks is that the Windies should be without their captain because of his second minor over-rate infraction

That he should be excluded after scoring an undefeated double century in Barbados and taking five wickets in Antigua is only part of the glumness, as is the fact that West Indies have straightened up and flown right to win a series against proper opposition — neither Bangladesh nor Zimbabwe — for the first time in seven attempts.

What stinks properly is that the Windies should be without their captain because of the irrelevance of his second minor over-rate infraction in 12 months.

Faf du Plessis knows how Holder feels, having sat out the third Test of SA’s series against Pakistan at the Wanderers last month.

Du Plessis’s predecessor, AB de Villiers, was a repeat offender.

“We will, of course, abide by the ICC [International Cricket Council] ruling, but we have to wonder if such punitive action at a pivotal stage of the series is good for cricket,” West Indies Cricket Board president Dave Cameron fumed.

“What a shame if the series is remembered not for the sparkling play of the reinvigorated West Indies players but for a crippling decision made by a rule that ought to be modified.”

That should only evoke more sympathy for Holder.

Unlike when he’s on the field, in Saint Lucia he won’t be able to escape blustering bores like Cameron — who reckons an already won series is “at a pivotal stage”, that a team in good form could be “crippled” by the removal of one player, and that there’s a danger this will be our most prominent memory.

Now that Holder isn’t busy playing or captaining up a storm, perhaps he could explain to people like Cameron how to tell a googly from a thigh pad.

But Cameron is dead right that overrate regulations should be reconsidered. Scrapped, even. What kind of sad bastard spectator sits there anally adding up how many overs have been bowled in an hour, and gets tense if it’s not at least 15? If they exist, cricket is better off without them — they’re likely missing a good game.

The real reason the suits get antsy about the over rate is because fewer overs per hour mean fewer ad breaks on television, which means less money for broadcasters, who ultimately own the game.

And, unlike scooping up the chi, there’s no way you can fake keeping the customer satisfied.