Stephen Vasciannie

THE WEST Indies Cricket Board has selected Ramnaresh Sarwan as the captain of our cricket ambassadors. This was always on the cards. Sarwan is a reliable, dynamic batsman who demonstrated good form during the Cricket World Cup. I would have given some consideration to the other Mr. Reliable, Shivnarine Chanderpaul but, bearing in mind age and other factors, Sarwan is the better choice.

The board is reported to have given much thought to Darren Ganga. Now, in some cases, captains hold their position on a cricket team qua captain; or to continue the elementary Latin, they are captains simpliciter. They hold their position as captain because of their tactical skills, managerial attributes and ability to foster collegiality. But they cannot command a place on the team in any other capacity. This, I believe, may have been the case with England's Ray Illingworth in the late sixties to early seventies; more recent English candidates for the post of captain simpliciter come to mind.

Nepotism?

If Ganga had been given the position, he would have joined this very small category. Clearly, he has not been able to hold his position as a batsman, in the minds of the same selectors choosing the captain. And yet, they gave serious thought to naming him as the team leader. There are probably two explanations for this apparent contradiction.

The first is that Ganga was almost the beneficiary of the brand of nepotism that analysts call cricket insularity. Team captaincy had rested in Port-of-Spain under Lara, so there may have been some pressure to keep the captaincy in Trinidad and Tobago. I mention this explanation to dismiss it: the selectors must, I believe, be well beyond the charge of insularity at this stage. The cricketing public wants performance, so simply to select a captain on the basis of his nationality would be rejected out of hand by the selectors - selectors led, incidentally, by Gordon Greenidge, a sophisticated man who was critical of cricket insularity in his autobiography.

The second, more plausible, explanation is that the selectors were openly reticent about Sarwan to send a signal to him about performance. Had Sarwan been selected by acclamation, then the board would be vulnerable to serious criticism whenever the West Indies team failed to live up to our expectations. As a hedge, therefore, the selectors may have said metaphorically: look, we have agonised over the selection; Sarwan has pros and cons, as do others, but in the end we went for Sarwan as the best of a weak lot. Do not hold us responsible if he does not fit the bill, for we are aware of his limitations.

Samuels

We should now give Sarwan a chance. Captaincy is not an easy task, and some come to it more naturally than others: Sir Frank was a natural, while Sir Gary probably was not, the latter preferring apparently to lead with the sound of his willow than with the timbre of his voice. Sarwan will have team issues in England, and apparently even before England. Already, some critics have whispered that the non-selection of Marlon Samuels may be attributed to the new captain.

This is unfair to the skipper. Though he participated in the selection of the 15-member squad for the English tour, he was at most one member among equals - just brought in as captain, it is highly unlikely that he could have had a "my way or the highway" attitude, ab initio.

Incidentally, I would have selected Samuels. This is not because I think his brother, Robert, was unreasonably treated by the board. Marlon stands purely on the merit of Marlon, and his brother should have nothing to do with his selection; neither nepotism nor reverse nepotism should be supported. Marlon is unquestionably a better batsman than some who have been selected. That should be the decisive consideration.