- Monday 05, April-2004

AMIDST criticisms of his captaincy, West Indies’ skipper Brian Lara has done the right thing in moving forward and getting on with the job, says chairman of selectors Sir Vivian Richards.
He said Lara needed “support in these factors” but he was pleased how he was handling the latest crisis in West Indies cricket following England’s first series triumph in the Caribbean in 36 years.

“This particular series would’ve been pretty devastating for the young man . . . and the sort of emotion that Brian would have shown yesterday would have been on the sad side,” Sir Vivian said on Starcom Network’s radio programme Point At Issue yesterday.

The former West Indies skipper said he is happy that Lara had opted not to give up the captaincy at this stage and is already looking ahead to the fourth and final Test in Antigua.

“This is the way great men do things. I think after all the stuff that he would’ve encountered in this game, it is important that he continues to show resilience and the faith that people have put in him to lead this thing to the very end,” Sir Viv said.

“It is so easy to run away from responsibility, but I would like to think that he’s man enough and, just judging from the way he would have performed over the years, he is going to accomplish that.”

Sir Vivian, who never lost a Test series when he led the West Indies and was at the helm when England were hammered 5-0 in 1986, noted every leader has his own style.

“I like to think that when an individual is in charge out there, that’s his call. We see things so differently from so many different angles. that’s the way Brian thinks,” he said.

“We can look at results and some of the sequences and say that they didn’t quite work.”

Caribbean Cricket

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