Gayle storm shows its fury, but WICB looks the other way

That Chris Gayle took the IPL by storm is an understatement. When he smacked his West Indian team-mate Pollard for a six in the semi-final, you could just feel his impact. When he decimated the opposition with sheer disdain, you could feel his power. When he single-handedly carried the Bangalore Royal Challengers to the final, you could see his value. We could all see how he could carry his team to a different realm. That’s all of us – except the West Indies Cricket Board. The decision of the WICB to drop him for the first two ODIs against India is baffling beyond words. In his first match in the IPL, he smashed a century out of the blue. In his next one, he cracks another nasty hundred. And then the runs kept flowing in such a torrent that it would have made white-water rafting possible. The statistics speak for themselves: in 12 matches, he scored 608 runs at a whopping average of almost 68 with a strike rate of 183.3 – almost 2 runs per ball for 12 games. Add to this his off-breaks, and you get a cricketer who is on top of the world at the moment. Despite this, the WICB dropped him like a hot potato. [caption id=“attachment_18672” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“West Indies cricket needs Chris Gayle but is the WICB listening? AFP”] [/caption] When he scored these runs in IPL, the opposing team is stung so badly that they virtually never recovered. I mean, just ask Prashant Parameswaran. That poor lad got walloped for 37 runs in an over by Gayle and it would take a long time for him to find his feet again. It’s not necessarily the quantity of runs that are scored, but the brutal manner in which they are scored that impresses. Despite this crushing aura of invincibility that he brings, the WICB drops him. From the spectator’s point of view, Gayle is a pleasure to watch. He brings to the Caribbean the flair that they haven’t had a glimpse of since Vivian Richards and Brian Lara retired. This could be the perfect opportunity for the Board to bring back the crowd that has disappeared of late. I mean watching a Chris Gayle innings is an event by itself and against an Indian bowling attack devoid of Zaheer Khan, he would be almost certain of coming good. Despite all this, the WICB drops him and it’s baffling. First up, Gayle was recently humiliated by the West Indies Cricket board. Dropped as captain in favour of Darren Sammy and not picked for the ODIs against Pakistan. Gayle received this news through the media. The WICB didn’t bother taking him aside and informing him. I think the WICB needs to understand this: the number one contributor in the fall of West Indies cricket is the cricket board itself. Now, it wants an unconditional apology from Gayle before he can play. At the end of the day, the thing it needs to remember is that without the Jamaican in the team, the West Indies will continue to languish at seventh in the ICC Test rankings and eighth in the ODI rankings. For the WICB, there has to be some sense of logic prevailing over selection rather than bickering over sponsorship issues, player union issues and more such issues. The whole idea should be to take West Indies cricket forward. Of course, as an Indian fan, having Gayle as part of the series against India gives us hope of some riveting action that makes staying up nights worthwhile. So, we are being a little selfish here. But I’m guessing that’s allowed. But it probably all boils down to this: If Chris Gayle was Indian, in his present form, there is a high possibility that he would walk into the Indian side who are champions of the world. And he still can’t find his way into the West Indian team? Someone, somewhere needs to get their head right.