Dr. Allen Sammy, one of Trinidad and Tobago’s two directors, has indicated the format was used as a cost-cutting measure, and to use limited resources to offer the better players greater exposure with the staging of West Indies A-Team tours instead.
“The cricket committee of the WICB had recommended that we play just one round of matches in the regional series instead of having the best players continue to play with the not so good ones in another round of matches,” Sammy told the Trinidad Guardian newspaper.
“The idea was to get the best players after one round of matches and send them to play against A-Teams from the other nations in the World.
He added: “This, we thought, would make better sense because our players will be exposed to better players and a higher standard of play.
“A lot of people had given the WICB licks for this move, but [we] did not get the message out properly.”
Prior to the start of the season, Ernest Hilaire, chief executive officer of the WICB, had outlined the same reasons for the return to the format, following an extended season the previous year, when the seven regional teams played each other on a home-and-away basis.
But the WICB was roundly criticised – not least by the West Indies Players’ Association – for cutting the season in half again, and drew further censure for also choosing to stage the matches in each of the seven rounds in a “single” territory.
This did not prevent Jamaica however, from winning the regional first-class championship for the third straight year.
Sammy also dismissed charges that the WICB has failed to use former West Indies players in an advisory role.
“There have been [comments] around the Caribbean that the WICB has not being using our former players, and this is really so far from the truth,” he said.
“We have the Cricket Committee which includes former Test players, and a number of recommendations from this committee are implemented by the WICB.”
He said: “There is only one member of that committee that did not play for West Indies, and that is Lyndel Wright out of Jamaica, and he played over 50 regional games.”
