THE SPORT was different but negotiations were as long, as tough and often as acrimonious as those that have dragged on for so long between the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and the West Indies Players Association (WIPA).

Just when it seemed there would be another costly and bitter cancellation of a high-profile, professional North American sport, the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the players' union finally reached agreement on a new, six-year deal last month.

"We decided it was time to back away from the abyss and see if we could get a deal," union director Billy Hunter said afterwards.

It should be a salutary lesson to both the WICB and the WIPA.

Over the past three years, the WICB and the WIPA have lurched closer and closer to their own abyss, fighting fiercely to maintain their positions without either seeming to recognise the rapidly approaching chasm of destruction.

Indeed, it is quite the opposite. Even as their squabbling leaves West Indies cricket destabilised and divided, each proclaims that its intention is to make it strong again and its respective position is based on principle.

In truth, there are such mutual feelings of suspicion, betrayal, treachery and much more besides that it is impossible to believe that those acting on their behalf now have it in them to follow the lead of Billy Hunter and NBA commissioner David Stern.

The constant bickering has led to one actual and two threatened strikes, brought politicians and High Court judges into the picture and placed three international series in jeopardy.

It has caused the exclusion from one Test of several of the best players from a team already languishing in the nether regions of world cricket and an even more devastating decimation of the squad for the upcoming tour of Sri Lanka.

As they have argued over one issue after another – always, it seems, intentionally at the very last moment – they have pitted fan against fan, even territory against territory but, most damaging of all, player against player.

All the while, performances on the field mirror the confusion off it.

The public has become so disenchanted with the whole sorry business that they now sell their Test tickets to British visitors or else don't turn up at all.

It is surely more than simple coincidence that the confrontation has become more belligerent since 2002 when Dinanath Ramnarine was elected president and chief executive of WIPA and Roger Brathwaite took over as chief executive of the WICB, within a couple of months of each other.

They have since been responsible for the bilateral negotiations and, as such, have to take ultimate responsibility for the widening gap between their two bodies.

Both are earnest in their endeavours. They can point to worthy work in other areas and have sought what is best for their constituents. But that has been demonstrably not the best for West Indies cricket.

The chemistry between them is wrong. They make too combustible a mix. An explosion seems imminent with each confrontation.

It is now high time for Brathwaite and Ramnarine to give way and for the task of negotiations to be passed on to two qualified individuals, with different advisers, none tainted with the resentment and frustration that have been the hallmarks of dealings between the WICB and the WIPA.

Only a cockeyed optimist would expect everything to be hunky-dory with such a move. It won't necessarily allow Justice Adrian Saunders to get back to his duties at the Caribbean Court of Justice without having to concern himself with Clause 5, Keith Mitchell to resume his prime ministerial duties without cricketing distractions, or for Shivnarine Chanderpaul to suddenly lead a team completely happy with its lot and at last winning matches.

But it would be a fresh start – and that is what West Indies cricket needs now.

* Tony Cozier is the leading cricket writer and broadcaster in the West Indies.