England in the West Indies.

England in the West Indies.

The English cricket team has often found itself in paradise but once again they find themselves up against the one cricketing nation who always used to leave them trembling with fear. The West Indies, in the past tense, were, at one time, one of the most formidable cricketing sides in the world. Not any more or so it would seem. But who knows they may just decide to turn on the style once again in the hope of a resurgence that might be just around the corner.

For the time being the beaches of  Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, and Jamaica, St Kitts and a whole string of purple pearled islands may have to content themselves with a steady improvement and a gradual return to peerless greatness. But no longer are those islands singing happily to the sound of the sweet crack of willow on red ball.

 The kids want to play football perhaps and cricket is of secondary importance although there has to be a small core of young, emerging West Indian cricketers who would just love to emulate the feats world class gentlemen who so proudly adorned the exotic Caribbean jersey. It almost seems as if the heartbeat of West Indies cricket is no longer throbbing quite so powerfully as it used to. It's as if somebody has deliberately ripped the plug out of the Windies electrical socket.

And yet the England team arrived in Barbados to be greeted with the rich smell of rum and coconut juice and a private conviction that maybe this time they can emerge triumphant. Amid those swaying palm trees and the stirringly melodious sounds of the steel drums in their ears, England will be doing their utmost to putting behind them the woes and troubles of yesteryear.

The fact is that during the 1970s the West Indies were simply unbeatable, a force of nature, a side of boldness, bravery, class and brazen flamboyance. The West Indies possessed some of the most lethal and destructive batsmen in the world of cricket would ever witness. They would hook the ball for innumerable sixes and fours that would invariably end up in local high streets or bouncing off cars and buses before ending up in a shop doorway far, far away. They would slog, punch, cover drive and sweep the ball off back and front and back foot with gleeful enjoyment and not a single moment's hesitation.

Those players were the remarkably gifted Viv Richards, a batsman with savagery and callousness in that bat, a bat that swung like a metronome and a man who timed the ball to perfection. Richards would hook delightfully and drive the ball to all four corners of a cricket ground as if determined to lose it. He would hunch those broad, muscular shoulders which reminded you of solid rock and then take up residence as, frequently, opening batsman before blasting and slogging the ball with merciless power.

Then there was captain Clive Lloyd, pantherine and with legs that seemed to go on for ever. Lloyd was a brilliant strategist and thoughtful captain who would lope across from gully or deep with the majesty of a leopard. There was Gordon Greenidge and Roy Fredericks, Alvin Kallicharran, the studious Rohan Kanhai, players with a definitive match winning temperament, cricketers of steel, nerves of steel, showboating, grandstanding brilliance. They would skip out of the pavilion on an early sun kissed morning at Trent Bridge, noble emperors, stunning practitioners of their craft and full of witty expressions at the crease.

Then there were the bowlers, the quickies, the catapult slingers, the men who delivered those ruthless missiles that flew past opposition batsmen as if they were propelled by some supernatural force. There was Andy Roberts. Malcolm Marshall, Michael Holding and Joel Garner who was so tall that he looked as if he would have been better employed as a weatherman. All four men were silent cricketing assassins. silent at first but then intense and explosive, as noisy and stentorian as a steam train hurtling into a railway station.

Now though the West Indies have Jason Holder as the West Indies skipper, Carlos Brathwaite, Fabian Allen, Samuel Badree, Darren Bravo, Devendra Bishoo and Sunil Ambris and Kraiss Brathwaite, the modern today generation, the new buds on the rosebush, wet behind their ears quite possibly and wondering if their predecessors would still swell with pride if only they could do half as well as they did in their heyday.

You see the problem is that the infrastructure of West Indian cricket is not nearly as sound as it used to be and there are those out there who doubt whether we'll ever see another Sir Garfield Sobers, another set of Worell, Weeks and Walcott, the classically built Learie Constantine or any of those magicians and conjurors who turned every cricketing match into a musical carnival.

The mind tenderly takes you go back to the wondrous Sobers and that famous Sunday John Player League six fest against Glamorgan during the late 1960s. It may have been just like any ordinary Sunday afternoon for Sobers but when he planted that final six of six sixes into some far distant corner of an English meadow the rest of cricket knew that it had almost certainly set eyes upon the greatest cricketer they'd ever seen.

But now the England of Joe Root, a natural leader of men, Ben Stokes and Stuart Broad, bowlers of strength and resourcefulness, powerful and admirable consistency, men who can so readily rise to the occasion whatever the day, month or week. They will stroll into a bright Caribbean winter sun, drink in the spice of a Test match atmosphere and just have the time of their lives.

 With Johnny Bairstow always ready to be assertive and richly productive when the mood takes him, Jos Buttler, full of fluent and captivating strokes and the promising Jake Ball, primed and ready to go, this could be the winter to remember for English cricket. We feel sure that Jimmy Anderson will bowl with all the enthusiasm of  the youngster in the playground who just loved to play cricket all day and deep into the evening. Will the roles though be completely reversed this time and for once will English cricket finally emerge from a West Indian field with a victory rather than that sinking feeling again? It remains to be seen and we can but hope.