ACS Overseas First-Class Annual 2016

West Indies in 2015/16 Over less than 50 days in early 2016, West Indian cricket supporters – so deprived of success in recent years – had three genuine triumphs to celebrate. First, on 14 February, was the winning of the ICC Under-19 World Cup (50 overs), secured with a five-wicket win in the final against pre-tournament favourites India. No less unexpected, and therefore welcome, were their victories (both at Kolkata on 3 April) in the finals of both the women’s and the men’s ICC World T20 championships, beating favourites Australia in the former, and England in the latter thanks to Carlos Brathwaite’s four sixes off the first four balls of the last over. The Under-19s’ success gave some hope of the existence of a new generation of Caribbean cricketers who might at least hold their own in the Test arena in years to come. But for the senior side in 2015/16 and 2016 it was more of the same disappointing Test form as had been in evidence for far too long. The senior side played three Test series in this period, two away and one at home, and lost the lot, without managing a single victory in any of the nine matches involved. In truth they did not even get close in any of the nine games, though they emerged with some credit from the match against India at Kingston when, after conceding a first innings deficit of 304, their middle and lower order batted heroically through the last day to save the game and even take an overall lead. (The scorecard of this match, and the other three Tests against India, will be found in the 2016 section of the Annual.) One of the heroes in the fightback at Kingston was Barbadian Roston Chase, playing in only his second Test match, who scored an undefeated century after taking five wickets in the Indian innings – a match double previously achieved by only three of his compatriots, and big names at that (see page 580). It was too early to say that a new star had arrived, but Chase’s early success, along with that of quick bowler Miguel Cummins (who took nine wickets in the following Test, also in his second match at this level) at least gave some cause for optimism – as did the arrival in the Test team of the first of the winning Under-19 team, quick bowler Alzarri Joseph. Nevertheless, successive 2-0 series defeats by Sri Lanka, Australia and India left West Indies stuck in eighth place in the ICC rankings, and their margin over ninth-placed Bangladesh reduced over this period from 29 ranking points to just 10. It might have been different if the regular ‘stay-aways’ from Test cricket – including the likes of Chris Gayle, Dwayne Bravo, Darren Sammy and Andre Russell – had been available for the Test side; but for one reason or another they were not, and the national side surely suffered, both in results and in spectator appeal, as a consequence. There was however one piece of better news on the Test front during the year, when it was announced that a new BCCI administration had waived the $42m claim previously made on the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) following the abandonment by the West Indies of their tour in India in 2014. The four-match series between the two countries in the Caribbean in July and August was the first fruits of this rapprochement; it has also been announced that the West Indies will return to India in 2017 “to complete the ‘unfinished’ matches from the 2014 series”. The disappointing on-field performances of the Test side led many to call for the return of Shiv Chanderpaul, whose dependable middle-order batting had been absent from the side since May 2015 - and not, in his case, of his own choosing. He had not officially retired from Test cricket, and neither had the selectors said outright that he would not be selected in future; but despite the clamour of supporters it seemed certain that his Test career, which had begun as a 19-year-old in March 1994, was at last over. Finally, early in 2016, the situation was resolved when Chanderpaul announced his formal retirement from Test cricket, with 11,867 runs to his name – only 86 behind West Indian record-holder Brian Lara – and 30 centuries, many of them made when his back was against the wall. He may not have been the prettiest player to watch, or the most exciting (though we should not forget that he once hit a Test century in 69 balls off an 503