WICB favours Arthur as new coach

WICB favours Arthur as new coach

Vinode Mamchan
Published: Guardian
Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Ottis Gibson no longer in charge of the West Indies cricket team.
Just days after the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) changed the regional selection panel, they continued their house cleaning yesterday by removing Ottis Gibson as coach of the regional side.

The former all-rounder, who played two Tests and 15 One-Day internationals for the Windies, served England as bowling coach from late 2007 until he came back home to take charge of the regional unit in February 2010.

Information reaching the T&T Guardian is that he was likely to be replaced by for the former South Africa and Australia coach Mickey Arthur. The South African, Arthur recently finished his duties with the Jamaica Tallawahs in the Limacol Caribbean Premier League T20 tournament.

WICB Cricket operations director Richard Pybus met with Gibson after a string of poor performances from the regional side. The two did not see eye to eye on many matters and in the end the WICB directors were made aware of the feelings of both Pybus and Gibson.

The directors held a teleconference over the weekend and a decision was made to terminate the services of Gibson and the hunt was then on for a new coach. With the West Indies due to play Bangladesh from tomorrow in Grenada in a three-match, two-Test and lone T20 series, a coach was needed immediately and Pybus met with Arthur at the Hyatt Regency in St Kitts.

It is understood that although all terms have not been worked out, Arthur will take charge for the Bangladesh series. Gibson’s contract was not up for renewal, since he renewed his contract last year. It was for a period of three years and due to end in February 2016.

At the time of renewing the contract, WICB chief executive officer Michael Muirhead said: “Ottis has added significant value to the development of the West Indies team during his tenure and we are delighted to have secured his services for another three years.” “Most notably is that he led the implementation of a system of professionalism within the team unit and curbed the negative results, which we were experiencing with some frequency. There have also been clear successes under his stewardship from 2010 to date. These include, most notably, having coached the team to the World Twenty20 title, the team showing consistent improvements in the other formats, the reintegration of players into the team unit and the achievement of the set goals as outlined in the WICB Strategic Plan 2011-2016,” Muirhead said.

The West Indies continue to struggle in the Test and ODI formats and this has prompted many changes under new president Dave Cameron.

Darren Sammy was removed as ODI captain and replaced by Dwayne Bravo, while the St Lucian was also replaced as Test captain by Denesh Ramdin. Sammy has held on to his post as T20 captain. Recently the changes continued with former Test captain Clive Lloyd replacing Clyde Butts as chief selector, while Eldine Baptiste and Courtney Walsh were also made selectors. Making way for them was Robert Haynes, while Courtney Browne was been sent to deal with youth selection and women’s cricket.