T20 World Cup 2014: The Caribbean T20 spirit

Can Darren Sammy and Co. do a 2012 encore?

“West Indies fans of the 1970s and 80s unite,” said my marketing professor on his Facebook timeline after the Carribeans’ remarkable triumph in the World T20 2012. Those who had tracked Windies’ progress in the tournament wouldn’t agree more. Fans born in the 70s and growing up in the 80s talk about the enthralling experience of watching greats like Sir Viv Richards, Michael Holding, Joel Garner etc., while those growing up in the 90s harp on the impact that players like Brian Lara, Curtly Ambrose and Courtney Walsh, to name a few, had on the team. Few teams have evoked as much enigma in cricket fans as the West Indies have done.

Why does a Caribbean victory bring out more joy than other teams’ do? West Indies is not just any other cricket team. India and Pakistan victories in the first two editions in 2007 and 2009, respectively, were the ones which helped erase some unfavourable incidents in the then recent past; the former for its dismal ODI World Cup campaign and the latter for the terrorist attack on cricketers in Lahore. England in 2010 under Paul Collingwood were seen as a team that had finally found its groove. In the case of West Indies, one of the things that is most talked about, apart from the style of play, is the ‘Caribbean spirit’.

The most distinctive image that stands out in the last edition is Chris Gayle’s ‘Gangnam Style’ dance each time he picked a wicket. It all culminated in the whole team doing the dance after the final with Gayle leading the way. This ability to keep the spirits up throughout a match brings smiles on the faces of not only the fans but also the opposition. When they win a major tournament, they are great fun; When they are not firing, they are a bore.

In 2007, when the world was just warming up to the concept of T20 cricket with a curiosity about what a World Cup for the shortest format would be like, Chris Gayle scored a century in the very first T20 WC match against South Africa. It showed that apart from completing an innings in just about 90 minutes, it is also possible to pace your innings to score a century in that limited time frame. (South Africa then showed how to overhaul a 200+ score in 20 overs.)

In 2009, the West Indies were all over the news in the run-up to the T20 World Cup in England. They were to tour England for a Test and ODI series in the middle of the IPL season. Chris Gayle, the then captain, was not happy at leaving the lucrative tournament midway. He even told reporters that he may not play Tests for too long forcing reactions like ‘mercenary’, ‘money-minded’ etc. That his colleague Dwayne Bravo continued to play the IPL with an injury that ‘allowed him to play T20 but not Test cricket’ only made matters worse. Clearly, the Caribbean spirit was missing in that tour as the team went down without a single win in both the ODIs and the Tests.

Just when everyone expected them to go into the T20 World Cup with the same enthusiasm level (or the lack of it), Gayle stunned one and all with his brutal hitting against Australia in the league match. The team managed to reach as far as the semis before crumbling to Sri Lanka. Post the tournament, contract issues arose with the WI cricket board, and most of the mainstream players like Gayle and Bravo went into boycott mode forcing the board to field a Tier-2 team for the Champions Trophy. The impasse was later resolved, and the boycotting players returned to the international arena. They could not make a mark in the 2010 edition, though, managing just a solitary win in the Super 8s against India.

After Gayle’s roller-coaster of an IPL ride in 2011 – from not being picked in the auction to then enter the tournament as a replacement player and end it as the leading run-scorer – the Carribean spirit appears to have been rejuvenated. With Darren Sammy at the helm as captain, a new life seemed to have been infused into the team.

All eyes would be on the Windies to see if they can not only do an encore of 2012 but also in the spirited manner in which they did it then. Rewind to 2004 when Courtney Browne and Ian Bradshaw took the Windies to a Champions Trophy victory from a no-hope situation: one moment in the last decade that revived the 70s and 80s Caribbean might. Sammy would do well to deploy his most effective resources to the fullest in order to bring back what hardcore cricket fans would definitely enjoy watching and celebrating.