THE
The retention of captain Shivnarine Chanderpaul and vice-captain Ramnaresh Sarwan were forwarded to the WICB after a selectors' meeting in Trinidad on Tuesday at which players were chosen for the one-off Twenty20 match, five One-Day Internationals and five Tests on the tour from February 16 to March 31.
The deferment of an official release indicates that some WICB directors want more information from the panel on the captaincy issue.
Following broadcast speculation that Trinidad and Tobago captain Daren Ganga had been earmarked for the position, convenor of selectors Joey Carew told me Tuesday the panel (also comprising head coach Bennett King, Gordon Greenidge and Clyde Butts) had decided to keep Chanderpaul and Sarwan.
While he was keen to clarify the issue, Carew said in a telephone call yesterday that protocol dictated that his comments on the captaincy and on overall selection were not meant for publication prior to an official WICB announcement.
They had been made under that understanding, he said.
Clearly, we got our wires crossed and the details I reported in yesterday's edition, mainly to clear up the conjecture over Ganga, have embarrassed Carew and his fellow selectors and prompted censure from the WICB.
While the WICB routinely rubber-stamps the selectors' choice of captain, it retains the authority to reject it.
When the panel, then headed by Wes Hall, put forward Brian Lara for the 1997 tour of Sharjah and Pakistan, the WICB decided to retain Courtney Walsh.
The controversial change from Walsh to Lara followed a few months later for the 1998 home series against England, following the West Indies 3-0 whitewash in Tests in Pakistan.
The 31-year-old Chanderpaul might not have unanimous support within the WICB. But director Chetram Singh, president of the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB), yesterday backed his retention and that of Sarwan.
"Chanderpaul has captained for a year and, while he did not have all the success, he needs a better run with a united team, now the players are back together, to see where the team can go under him," Singh said.
"The team is more united now and should have a better run against New Zealand."
Singh described Sarwan as "a good prospect in the long term".
Chanderpaul took over for the home series against South Africa and Pakistan last season after Lara withdrew over the exclusion of six players from the team following a sponsorship dispute.
He led a squad of reserves to Sri Lanka in July and August when the other leading players observed a boycott called by the West Indies Players' Association (WIPA) over a long-running disagreement over contracts with the WICB.