Posted by It’s easy to characterise Chris Gayle as a man who’d rather play Twenty20 for money than international cricket for less money. However, recent jumping has taken him through a number of hoops in order that he is now, once again, able to play for the West Indies.
Essentially, the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) made him get down on bended knee and kiss their boots using the right technique.
The WICB chief executive, Ernest Hilaire, basically said that Gayle had to make himself fully available by cancelling all his current commitments and if he did, then he would be considered for selection. It was like saying ‘jack in your day job and we might give you a few hours of freelance work – no promises though’.
Gayle did jack in the day job, however – meeting the WICB’s rather unnecessary demands – and is now facing possible legal action from Somerset, with whom he had signed a contract. Hopefully, they’ll chill out and spend the money they’ll save on Ajmal Shahzad instead, because they’re short of bowlers.
The good news is that we should get to see Chris Gayle in international cricket this summer. Lancashire’s Oliver Newby isn’t the only person who’s ‘partial to a bit of Chris Gayle spanking‘. He’s a great cricketer and this is a great story, by the way.
He’s not genuflecting. He’s preparing to slog sweep.
But seriously it sucks to hear there’s potentially another board that is as petty as the WICB.
“The WICB chief executive, AND MAN WITH WORLD’S MOST OXYMORONIC NAME, Ernest Hilaire, basically said…”
Nice links though.
He’s not turning up until after the Tests, right? So who cares?
All I see is Chris Gayle doing what’s best for Chris Gayle, as per usual. If I were a Somerset member I’d be screaming. I hope he gets torn a new one by their lawyers.
Shd v all rite lyk dis to praise da gale?
Gayle is a total tool really – a soon to be sad cricketing footnote from a period when a few deluded idiots tried to rebrand cricket as baseball and define batting greatness (the ony kind of greatness there is in their view) through the ability to hit sixes. Somerset are well shot – no need to besmirch the memory of the good times when their West Indian players were truly great, not complete and utter cocks.
Because Viv Richards and Joel Garner never simply went where the money was.
He probably will end up as a footnote, but the sad thing was he should have been worth a page at least. He has a test triple hundred. He is breathtaking at his best. What he says, does and wears annoys the hell out of me frequently, and he does deserve at least some of the grief he has got, but it isn’t fair to dismiss him as a 20-20 thrasher and i refuse to take any delight in someone (at least someone non-Australian) who hasn’t been as much of an ornament to outr sport as he should have been. So there.
I dunno – Ed Smith in one of his articles suggests that great players are somehow aware that they have it within them to become great, and hence put in the appropriate practice hours etc – witness Bradman, Tendulkar. By the same token, total cocks sort of know deep down they are total cocks, and hence fanny around as they know that’s all they can really do. Gayle definitely falls into the second category.
Where does Ed Smith fit in his own “genius to cock” continuum, in your opinion, jimmy? And in Ed’s opinion?
In other news:
Keith Barker! Keith Barker! Keith Barker!