By Donald Duff
Stabroek News
June 5, 2001

Host of the popular television cricket programme Allan Bazilio said yesterday that the resignation of Pat Rousseau as president of the West Indies Cricket Board over the Ricky Skerritt issue was surprising.

"I was pretty surprised that Rousseau decided to step down over the Skerritt issue since there have been a number of more serious debacles during his tenure," Bazilio said.

Bazilio said Rousseau presided over a number of what he termed "minor catastrophes," but held on to the presidency.

Rousseau could, said Bazilio, in a sense be blamed for his handling of the Brian Lara/ Carl Hooper stand-off that nearly brought to a calamitous end the West Indies inaugural tour of South Africa.

Then, Bazilio added, there was the over-age fiasco of several Under-19 West Indian cricketers for the 1998 inaugural Youth World Cup in South Africa.

Added to those, two major faux pas are the Sabina Pitch fiasco where the first Test match of the 1998 series between England and the West Indies had to be abandoned half an hour into the first day and only recently the situation concerning the West Indies scheduled camp in preparation for South Africa's visit where most of the players were in Jamaica participating in the Busta Cup final and only a handful turned up for the camp in Trinidad.

Bazilio, who said there have been more but not all of the board's policies reached the attention of the public.

Bazilio said he was also concerned about the quality of administrators who might be eligible to replace Rousseau and suggested that former players David Holford, Wes Hall, Alloy Lequay and Clive Lloyd's names could come into the reckoning.

Bazilio said he feels that Holford has what it takes while Hall he said was very articulate and could command the respect of the international cricket community.