Headline! Brendan Nash declares he’s available to play for Windies

Former West Indies vice-captain Brendan Nash believes the tourists are not getting what they need from their experienced players and need to recall some, but not all, of their Australian-based cricketers — himself included.

Nash, a former Queensland Sheffield Shield winner who played 21 Tests for the West Indies between 2007 and 2011, is now back playing first grade in the Brisbane competition for Toombul but said yesterday he was ready to answer an immediate SOS.

“Yeah, I’m still available,” Nash, who turned 38 three days ago, told The Australian.

“I like to think I can still move around the field quite well and (I’ve) been playing (English) county cricket, which has its challenge over there, and done pretty well in the last four seasons. They (the West Indies) still need that mix of experience and youth but they need the right kind of experienced players, I think.

“A tough position … they have to do well, those experienced players, but they have to lend time to help out the younger guys to make sure that when they’re finished the younger players then take over that mantle.”

A number of Windies greats, including Chris Gayle, Dwayne Bravo and Darren Sammy are also on hand — which is not to say immediately available — playing Big Bash League cricket if the tourists decide they need reinforcements.

Asked if he were a Windies selector whether he would bring them in, Nash coyly answered: “Maybe not all of them.”

He dodged the question of which ones he would recruit — “that could got me in trouble” — but then said that while Gayle had admitted he probably could not handle a five-day Test because of back surgery, Bravo might well be called in to join his half-brother, Darren Bravo.

“He can bat or bowl and his fielding is very good. Maybe as an outsider looking in, you can maybe see he doesn’t have that willingness to really compete at times, but I can tell you from an insider’s point of view that he did have that mentality.

“He wanted to win a lot and he tried to do everything he could in the field, whether he had the ball in his hand or the bat in his hand, his idea was to win. He was a tough competitor. Not saying that others aren’t.”

Obviously, before there can be any rapprochement, the rift between the disgruntled rump of senior players and the West Indies Cricket Board would need to be healed, something Nash considers highly unlikely.

“You need the right type of experienced players but I think the players have to have respect for the board, their decisions, and they have to believe in what they’re trying to do, and the board have to have a little bit of respect for the players as well,” he said.

Respect, however, is short supply where Caribbean cricket administration is concerned these days.

“I’ve been out of it for two or three years but from an outsider looking in that there is just no trust between either party.”

Then there is the trust between the Windies and the most experienced member of the touring side, Marlon Samuels. He played the Hobart Test looking like he wanted to be anywhere else.

“Obviously a talented player,” said Nash.

“Maybe he’s had his issues with the board. I don’t know. As a senior player now, he’s the elder statesman in the group, played the most amount of international matches, seems like they’re not using his experience well enough or he’s not prepared to give it.”

Nash, who was born in Australia but whose father Paul was a Jamaican Olympic swimmer, was held in such esteem in the Caribbean that in the latter stages of his Test career, he sat in on a board meeting where his captaincy credentials were discussed, believes money is being misspent by administrators.

Again, having almost the prised the lid off the morass that is West Indian cricket, he decides to say no more.

But the reality is that cricket facilities are so poor and substandard, he said, that batsmen can’t rely on good wickets and as a result bat to make as many runs in the short time before they are dismissed.

Little wonder, he said, that no one — well, aside from Kraigg Brathwaite and Darren Bravo — bats like they intend to stick around for a day or longer. “So I can’t see it getting better any time soon, unfortunately.”
theaustralian.com.au