By Neto Baptiste
Former national cricketers, Earl Waldron and Sylvester Joseph are bemoaning the ease in which players today are elevated to the national team set-up.
Speaking on the Good Morning Jojo Sports Show, Waldron who also played for the Leeward Islands team was blunt, stating that players underachieve consistently but still believe they are good enough to play at the next level.
“We all know it is okay for you to average 15 and 20 in local cricket and still be arguing to get into the Antigua national team, but Bouncing [Sylvester Joseph] and I know that you better be scoring runs, you better be scoring hundreds and you better be in the top tier if you want to not just make Antigua’s team, but to get into a trial squad,” he said.
Meanwhile, former national and West Indies batsman Sylvester Joseph agreed that it was much harder to impress selectors some 20 years ago.
“Winning was paramount and I think we had the talent, we had the experience and we had guys who were really capable and really wanted to not only play for Antigua, but the ultimate goal was to play for the West Indies via the [route] of the Leeward Islands team, and so that was a big competition in the Antigua set-up as well. Guys wanted to go out and perform and score centuries as a batsman, take wickets as a bowler to get an opportunity to go to the next level,” he said.
Joseph captained the West Indies in one ODI match due to the more experienced players being unavailable courtesy of contract disputes. He scored 147 in five Tests and amassed 161 runs in 13 One Day Internationals for the senior West Indies team.