LESS than two months before the West Indies tour of England in the summer, negotiations over player contracts have still not got underway, raising the prospect of yet another tiresome, last minute confrontation between the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and the West Indies Players Association (WIPA).
The West Indies’ first match in England, against Somerset, starts May 12, just two weeks after the final of the current World Cup at Kensington Oval on April 28.
The first of four Tests at Lord’s follows May 17-21.
There are also two Twenty/20 internationals and three ODIs.
The delay in discussions between the WICB and the WIPA for the tour has been caused by the belated and protracted squabble over contracts for the current World Cup that necessitated the intervention of an arbitration panel.
In a statement prior to the series of four ODIs in India in January, the WIPA flagged its position for the England tour, noting that agreements for matches outside the International Cricket Council’s Future Tour Programme (FTP) “must be satisfactorily concluded, at least, one month prior to the departure of the team/players”.
It is potentially a bone of contention. The WICB contends that the England tour is part of the FTP for which it has a Memorandum of Understanding with the WIPA. The WIPA states it is not.
The players signed their World Cup contracts last week, almost two weeks into the tournament, following binding arbitration determined by a panel headed by Barbados’ Chief Justice Sir David Simmons and against a background of talk of strike action.
Yet WICB communication officer Tony Deyal acknowledged that the issue had “still not been resolved in the full sense of the word” and WIPA president Dinanath Ramnarine charged that the contracts “deviated from certain agreed provisions”.
Ramnarine and WICB director, Deryck Murray, are expected to meet with Simmons in Port-of-Spain for clarification on the details of the agreement that remain imprecise.
Arbitration was necessary after the two disagreed over the split of the anticipated US$11.5 million that the ICC is paying to each full member participating in the World Cup.
Simmons and his panel decided that 75 per cent should be retained by the WICB with 22 per cent shared between the 15 players in the squad and three per cent distributed to other first-class players in domestic tournaments.
That works out to around US$110,000 for each player, exclusive of their share of the money from new team sponsors for the Cup, the steel company, Mittal, and the sports gear manufacturers, Slazenger.
