‘What do they know of cricket who only cricket knows’: Emancipation Cricket Festival; Maddzart Political Cricket!

WHEN I LISTEN to the responses of some persons to the West Indies “shameful” dismissal in the Third Test against Australia I ask the rhetorical question posed by C L R James in his book BEYOND A BOUNDARY.

When the West Indies ruled the cricketing world we never looked beyond the boundary. In fairness to us we did not have the resources or population size to control cricket in the way India is doing today.

Cricket started in England in the 18th century.

The MCC (Marylebone Cricket Club that controlled cricket was founded in 1787. The British, with their colonial control and their establishment of slavery brought cricket to their Caribbean colonies through the garrisons and on the plantations and later transferred it to the elite schools. The first cricket club established here was at the then Boys Grammar School. These served to transfer British values. So, cricket was supposed to be a ‘gentleman’s game’.

At cricket there was a tea break. A West Indies Cricket Board of Control was established in 1926, and the first official tours were to England in 1928 and Australia in 1930/31 From the very beginning cricket was caught up in the race and class structure of Caribbean societies.

When West Indies gained test status, a white man was always captain until C LR James, then in Trinidad, led the charge to make Frank Worrel the first black captain, calling for Atkinson to go. There was one captain of whom it was said that he was better in the pavilion than on the field. On the estates/ plantations the whites were the ones who batted and used the enslaved or former enslaved to bowl. It was the view of many that this was the reason why in the early years blacks from the lower class were some of the best fast bowlers.

Cricket later became a source of pride with the emergence of persons like Garfield Sobers and Vivian Richards, and before them Worrell and the other WS.

Although this game came with the colonials, West Indian players were able to bring something special to the game, which cricketing nations worldwide liked.

Even the spectators, as can be seen in Britain, brought something special with their singing and general reaction in the pavilions and on the grounds. West Indians in England in the 1950s and 1960s said that whenever West Indies won a game, they would go to work the next day with an extra spring in their steps.

Every victory provided them with an opportunity to hit back at the racism in the society.

The West Indies cricket team’s period of glory has long since passed. The WIC honouring of the historic 1975 team, even after fifty years was well worth it and seemed to have been deeply appreciated. One would have thought that the honouring of those legends would have had some impact on our team, but it certainly did not.

I am not clear about the meaning of our Emancipation Cricket Festival. Is it so-called because it is being done around the time of the anniversary of our Emancipation? What complicates it even more for me is that one of the honourees, Alvin Kallicharan, was one of the rebel players who at the time of the anti-apartheid struggle decided to play in South Africa. There was an ICC moratorium on international teams touring South Africa and the anti- apartheid movement was growing. For West Indian players to be part of it was an insult to the West Indian public. I mention Kalicharan, but there were others like Lawrence Rowe and Colin Croft. Kallicharan had been one of my favourite players but after that rebel tour he was no longer. The West Indian cricketing community was appalled by their actions and made their feelings heard. They were banned from playing for the West Indies. But he was a member of the 1975 team, and I have no problem with whatever is given to him today.

But coming so soon after the CWI honouring ceremony, the Emancipation Cricket Festival must raise a lot of questions.

Once you live in SVG you will understand that much of this is pure politics and to me, part of the ‘Silly Season’. What is going to be the cost of the ‘Emancipation Festival’? I note that Dr. Gonsalves in his speech in parliament on Monday said, “Let us do honour to these great men without controversy today….” But there is a lot of controversy about it in SVG. And this is what Maddzart’s “Political Cricket” calypso is highlighting. This thing has become very divisive and is not what West Indies cricket wants at the moment. It might be that I misunderstand its relationship to emancipation, if there is any. What is regrettable is that the legends who many of us who are older admired, are being brought into what I consider a political bullfight. We have to do better and prevent any further divisions in this blessed land of ours. As we react and try to find answers to our sorry cricket situation, let us remember what C L R James asked, “What do we know of cricket who only cricket know”? It is much more than what is taking place on the field.

Much of it is BEYOND THE BOUNDARY!

_ Dr Adrian Fraser is a social commentator and historian Point of View