The addition of the name of the former legendary batsman to the speculative list of potential replacement for Phil Simmons has garnered mixed reactions. In opposition, some have pointed to Chanderpaul’s relative lack of experience, while others believe he would be more suited to a role in administration.
For Radford, who is well acquainted with the former player, there is no doubting the quality he would be able to bring to the role.
“I’m a big fan, I’ve often talked about Shiv and what he brought to the game as a player. He was a very hard worker and meticulous in preparation, a lot of the things I think he would instil as coach for the younger players,” Radford told the Mason and Guest show.
“He has been there and done it. He was number one in the world for a period of time, a top Test player in the world. He has played all round the world. I think he would bring a huge amount to it,” he added.
“He is new to coaching and still finding his feet but he is having relative success and I think he would bring a lot to it,” he added.
Radford, however, believes the former batsman would have to be supported by a very capable team, which is always the case for head coaches as opposed to specialist coaches. Chanderpaul, who retired from the sport six years ago, has already experienced some success as a coach, having led the Jamaica Tallawahs to the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) title last year.
Radford was a guest on the Mason & Guest radio show in Barbados on Tuesday in the wake of the Windies suffering a 0-3 ODI series defeat to Bangladesh.
“Clearly things have got to change with the white-ball because it is inconsistent. I’m sure the talent is there. It needs good planning, structure and organization,” Radford said.
“50-over cricket isn’t won by hitting balls over the ropes. You have to play the pitch; you’re not going to smash the ball over every boundary. On big grounds, you have to look for you ones and twos then when you get on small grounds, you can look to hit boundaries,” he added.
The hosts had a horrid time with the bat in the series, being restricted to scores of 149-9, 108 and 178 in their three times at the crease, unable to manoeuvre the Bangladeshi spinners on some difficult Guyanese pitches.
“You’ve got to be adaptable and flexible, play the situation, the team you are in front of and the ground you’re playing on. You can’t play white-ball cricket one way in every game and win. It’s not that type of game,” Radford said.
“If you can’t use your feet or you can’t sweep then you’ve really got to get one side of the ball, either stay leg-side or off-side. You have to do something. Just staying one place and allowing somebody to bowl at you and build up pressure is not going to take you anywhere,” he added.
Chanderpaul retired from international cricket in 2016 after an incredible, if unheralded, career that saw score 30 Test centuries and 11.867 Test runs. During that career in which he often played the sheet anchor role in the West Indies middle order, he had scores of 50 or more 96 times, which saw him end his playing career with a healthy average of 51.37.
His tenacity, refusing to give his wicket away cheaply, became a trademark for the soft-spoken Guyanese batsman.
Radford, who had two coaching stints with the West Indies, the last ending just before the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup, believes that batsmen in the Caribbean have been lacking in the kind of application shown by Chanderpaul during his playing days.
In the recently truncated season of the West Indies Four-Day Championship, no batsman scored more than two centuries with Jason Mohammed, Nkrumah Bonner, Paul Palmer Jr., John Campbell and Kyle Mayers, the only batsmen to do so.
In addition, only three batsman - Jermaine Blackwood, Kyle Mayers and Devon Smith scored more than of 600 runs during the season.
The numbers bring into sharp focus the apparent inability of the batsmen to remain at the crease for long-enough periods to score heavily.
“Could a player be a lot better if he reined himself in, prepared to bat a bit longer and prepare to bat through the difficult patches?” Radford said during an interview with News Room Sport.
“Someone like Shiv, if you bowled three tight overs, Shiv would play three maidens, but in the fourth or fifth over when you are tired, Shiv would pick you off because he had the patience. For him, the mental capacity to be patient is part of that as well,” Radford explained.
He added that some players have been impatient and eager to play big shots all the time leading to their downfall.
“It doesn’t matter how talented you are, if the all is not there in the right spot, you can’t put it away,” he said.
“I tell a lot of young players that Shiv Chanderpaul was professional and that’s the mindset you want to see with your young players coming through, this hunger and sell your wicket so dearly; do not give your wicket away and that was Shiv.”
The debate has continued to rage around the selection of the squad after the selection panel was unable to even considered some players for the World Cup squad after they had reportedly not made the requisite CWI fitness standard.
Among that crown were batsman Sherfane Rutherford, promising fast bowler Odean Smith and spinner Sunil Narine. With that considered, for some, the selection of players like Chris Gayle and Ravi Rampaul proved problematic, but both players were given exemptions by the CWI’s medical committee.
At current, all players are required to pass the popular Yoyo fitness test, but the results of the tests are graded on a sliding scale. The CWI has repeatedly insisted that its policy, along with the exemptions is a standard international practice. It has, however, continued to stir debate.
“You have to be seen to be fair across the board. Either everybody does it (meet fitness standard) or nobody does it,” Radford told the Mason and Guest radio program.
“You can’t choose who gets tested and who gets an exemption, it doesn’t seem to be a fair system. I think it either all the players are tested and they all need to pass it or they don’t,” he added.
“Otherwise, it makes a mockery of the test. You’re leaving out players who are on form and younger and fitter, generally, saying they haven’t passed the test and you are taking people 10 years older who struggle to run between wickets and the field.”
Brathwaite was widely commended for his role in leading an understrength team to a 2-0 win away to Bangladesh earlier this month. Holder, on the other hand, was one of 12 players to pull out of the tour after citing health and safety concerns.
Holder had, however, also pointed to feeling some level of fatigue having had to deal with quarantine situations in both the West Indies prior tours of England and New Zealand. However, in addition, aspects of the team’s performance on those tours had also put Holder and his captaincy under the microscope.
While admitting that the team had performed exceptionally well in Bangladesh, Radford, however, sees no reason to replace Holder as the man in charge for the upcoming Sri Lanka series.
“I think they surprised everybody not least of all Bangladesh, probably their own supporters as well. They performed really well. But it’s very easy to get carried away, isn’t it? You have a couple of big wins like that and then suddenly we have done it because Kraigg Brathwaite is captain and Jason Holder wasn’t captain,” Radford told the Mason and Guest radio program.
“Who’s to know if Jason was captain whether you would have had the two wins anyway,” he added.
“There were a lot of very good individual performances and because individuals play well and you win two matches, to me, that isn’t down to captaincy.”
In supporting his decision to stick with Holder, Radford pointed to the example of the incident with India captain Virat Kolhi, which occurred during the Asian team's big win over Australia.
“It was raised the other day, someone mentioned Virat Kohli. They (India) lost the game in Australia, he went home for the birth of his child. They went suddenly and won a couple of games. When they started the Test series against England, in India, nobody questioned whether Kohli should captain the team. He came back in because he was captain.”
Pybus, a former Director of Cricket, served in the post from January to April of last year before being replaced by Floyd Reifer, a few weeks ahead of the 2019 World Cup. Although his tenure was brief, Pybus is credited with orchestrating an outstanding performance from the West Indies cricket team that hosted England last year.
The Test team went on to reclaim the Wisden Trophy with a 2-1 series win over England and also matched up to the highly ranked tourists in the One Day International format where they secured a 2-2 draw. For some critics, the performances had nothing to do with Pybus but was merely a case of the team beginning to discover its full potential. Radford, who served as a member of Pybus’ staff, however, disagrees.
“I thought he was exceptional. Where Richard Pybus was very good was setting the agenda of where he believed the team could go, and getting the players to buy into ‘this is where we were headed’ Cameron told the Mason and Guest radio program.
“I remember the way he drew up on a flip chart, ‘what does a world’s number one look like?’ ‘If you took the world’s best team what is it that they do in Test match cricket?’ He got the players to write down what they needed to deliver. ‘We have to bat for 120 overs. We have to get 350 plus.’ He had all these things and the players were coming up with it, so it gave the players ownership. The players bought into this vision of what we were trying to deliver. So there were clear targets,” he added.
‘Another thing he brilliantly did he put the list of 11 players up, he put the England 11 up and he started to do match-ups. He would say ‘Shannon you have to take more wickets than Anderson’ and it was great there was competition for players with the opposition number. He had all these kinds of things. I think he was excellent as a manager and motivator.”
The omission of promising pace bowler Chemar Holder raised more than a few eyebrows when the squad was named last week, especially on the back of a promising debut in New Zealand. The Test squad at current features four spinners in Rahkeem Cornwall, Kavem Hodge, Veerasammy Permaul, and Jomel Warrican along with the regular fast bowling trio of Shannon Gabriel, Kemar Roach and Alzarri Joseph.
Cricket West Indies (CWI) chief of selectors, Roger Harper, went on to explain that Holder’s exclusion for additional spin bowling was based on the fact that the team was eager to take advantage of Bangladesh’s spin-friendly pitches.
Radford, who was part of a successful tour of the region in 2012, is unsure if that was the best approach.
“I’ve been listening to what people have been saying. We have gone heavy with a lot of spin. You expect the pitches to be slow and turn out there. Whether they need as many spinners as they are taking, I’m not too sure,” Radford told the Mason and Guest radio program.
“In fact, when we won in 2012 it was done with good batting, posting big scores and having pace, actually, guys who could get it down in the high 80s, 90 miles and hour, not just assuming that because it’s slow pitches spinners are going to do the work. I’m actually working for Bangladesh at the moment, I spent 6 weeks out there, they play spin very well, they’re brought up playing that kind of bowling.”
