IT is always distressing to observe the decline of a champion in any sport. Understandably, it can be personally demoralising for the player himself when he is advised he is no longer considered worthy of a place in the team in which he was an automatic choice through his career.
So it is with Shivnarine Chanderpaul whose sudden and unprecedented slump over two successive series, in South Africa and against England in the Caribbean, led the West Indies’ selectors to omit him from the two forthcoming Tests against Australia, effectively ending his illustrious career.
His 11 innings in three Tests each in South Africa and England in the Caribbean yielded 183 runs in 11 innings at an average of 16.63. Such figures were not misleading; he was just a sad shadow of a batsman who had been the most immovable object in the game.
Just six months earlier, a few weeks after his 40th birthday, Chanderpaul’s dogged batting defined his career, refusing to be budged by exasperated Bangladesh who toiled for 558 balls over 12 hours while he helped himself to 270 runs and registered his 30th Test hundred.
It boosted his Test average to 53.10; recent events have brought it down to 51.37, still a formidable figure. There it will now remain.
Chairman of the panel, Clive Lloyd, himself an icon of West Indies cricket, redundantly described Chanderpaul’s omission as “a tough decision to make”. This, after all, was the West Indian with the most Tests to his name (164) and second only to Brian Lara in runs scored (11,684 to 11,912) and hundreds hit (30 against 34).
It marks the end of an era. For a decade and more he has been the veritable godfather to the constantly changing players, a reliable stalwart in the difficult times that dragged West Indies from the summit of world cricket back to near its base.
He was never once involved in the several controversies that swirled around some of the others. In 2005, he took on the captaincy after most of the other leading players pulled out of the tour of Sri Lanka; it was an instructive experience that brought him face-to-face with the internal politics that divided the board and the players.
It was a background the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) officially asked Lloyd’s panel to consider in deciding on the left-hander’s future; it drew hundreds of similar pleas on internet blogs.
Lloyd and his colleagues would not be moved. While he extolled Chanderpaul’s contribution as fitting for official acknowledgment from the WICB, he said the resolute left-hander’s “quite rapid” decline at the age of 40 could not be camouflaged.
“We felt that the time had come to look towards younger players,” he said.
New head coach Phil Simmons was unequivocally forthcoming on the issue.
“It is not about giving someone a chance to reach a milestone,” he said in response to general appeals that Chanderpaul be given a chance in the Australia Tests to surpass Lara’s mark as the West Indies’ top run-scorer. “It is more about choosing a squad to win the Test series and when we went through the process, he didn’t fit in.”
It was confirmed at Sunday’s media conference that Simmons met with Chanderpaul after the final Test against England. It was not difficult to guess what they chatted about.
Lloyd said that he had written Chanderpaul a lengthy letter explaining the selectors’ decision. There had, as yet, been no response.
Typically, Chanderpaul did not see retirement as an option. He was indignant when told by the WICB in 2011 that he would no longer be picked for limited-overs cricket as its priority was building a team for the recent World Cup; during the ODI against Pakistan in Guyana, then president Bharat Jagdeo carried a placard around the Providence stadium proclaiming: “WICB is a disgrace”.
By his record alone, Chanderpaul leaves an exceptional legacy. Now the baton is passed on to the younger players Lloyd has challenged to fill the breach.
