The West Indies tour of South Africa is off to a bad start. Some senior players appear to be on strike, the Board has called an emergency meeting for tomorrow in Antigua and it is understood that captain Brian Lara and vice-captain Carl Hooper have been summoned.
The quarrel appears to be over money and travel arrangements.
In a statement yesterday, the West Indies Cricket Board confirmed that Lara and Hooper have not gone to South Africa. ``They have voiced concern over the fees for the tour of South Africa,'' the statement said.
Team members were scheduled to arrive in Johannesburg in three batches - the first batch yesterday morning and the last tomorrow. The first batch did not turn up and two of the team's senior players who participated in the Wills Cup in Bangladesh and who were scheduled to fly from Dhaka to Johannesburg today, went to London instead yesterday.
James Adams, Junior Murray, Franklyn Rose, Dinanath Ramnarine and Darren Ganga, were scheduled to leave London on Sunday for Johannesburg but, according to news coming out of South Africa, did not show.
Lara and Hooper, who were scheduled to travel from Dhaka to Johannesburg today, along with the seven other players who were selected for both the Wills Cup and the Test series, flew instead to London.
According to word reaching The Gleaner, Lara telephoned Adams and suggested that he and the players in London do not fly to Johannesburg.
Agreement
President of the Cricket Board Pat Rousseau said the Board has reached agreement with the players' representative body, the West Indies Players Association on the fees for the South African tour. He said that the players action was therefore ``particularly surprising and went against the instructions issued in writing by the manager, Clive Lloyd''.
Veteran fast bowlers Curtly Ambrose and Courtney Walsh, who left the West Indies for London on Sunday, were scheduled to fly from London to Johannesburg last night.
The first match of the tour is set for November 10 against Nicky Oppenheimer's X1 at Randjesfontein. A training camp is, however, scheduled to start on Thursday, and all the players were expected to be there on Wednesday.
It is understood that some of the team's senior players are up in arms against the West Indies Board, following travel arrangements and disagreement over fees.
The Gleaner understands the players are unhappy that some travelled business class to Dhaka for the Wills Cup and some ended up in economy, and also that a number of the senior players are demanding pay for attending the camp.
Efforts to contact the executives of the WICB yesterday were unsuccessful, but it is understood that as far as the Board is concerned nothing better could have been done about the travel arrangements for the simple reason that it had to await the date of travel to book the tickets and that when the bookings were done there were not enough seats in business class. As for paying the players to attend a training camp, the Board appears unwilling to consider this.