Gayle (left) and Samuels (right) By Tony Becca,
Senior Sport Editor
THE Jamaica Cricket Board of Control has written a letter to the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) protesting the interference of the West Indies team manager in the selection of Jamaica's team for the one-day match against the touring South Africans at Sabina Park last Wednesday.
Five Jamaicans - Christopher Gayle, Marlon Samuels, Wavell Hinds, Leon Garrick, Ricardo Powell - were included in the West Indies squad for the one-day match against South Africa at Sabina Park on Saturday, and according to the JCBC, its chief executive officer, Brian Breese, received a note from the manager of the West Indies team, Ricky Skerritt, instructing him to inform the chairman of the Jamaica selection committee that while Hinds and Powell could be selected, Gayle, Samuels and Garrick were not available to represent Jamaica.
The Jamaica selection committee was disturbed at the demand and referred the matter to the president of the JCBC who in turn checked with the chairman of the West Indies selection committee.
According to Michael Findlay, chairman of the West Indies selection committee, not only did he not know anything about the demand, but he was of the opinion that Gayle and Garrick should play.
Samuels, it is understood, was suffering from a minor injury.
After an intervention by Findlay, the matter was discussed, Garrick was allowed to play, and the Jamaica selectors reluctantly agreed not to select Gayle and Samuels.
The letter from the JCBC, signed by president Jackie Hendriks, to chief executive officer Gregory Shillingford and copied to president Pat Rousseau, read in part:
"I have never been aware that the West Indies team management could instruct territorial selectors whom they could and could not select to represent their country. To my certain knowledge and in my experience as both a West Indies team manager and chairman of the West Indies selection committee, if it has been felt necessary to rest a player in a territorial game for one reason or another, the policy has always been for the chairman of the West Indies selection committee to request the chairman of the territorial selectors to omit that player from the territorial team and it is then up to the territorial selectors to decide whether to accede to the request or not. After all, they want to put a fully representative team on the field.
"I would appreciate it if you would let me know whether the Board's policy has changed, and if so, what is the new policy. If not, then I would respectfully ask you to inform the West Indies team management that they have not got the authority to demand that certain players be omitted from their home team. In any event, it appears that such action by the team management has pre-empted one of the functions of the chairman of selectors."
