“Hooper or anyone else does not have the right to be captain or play for the West Indies team,” the outspoken Greenidge said in his column “Opening Up” in the latest edition of the Clico Cricket Quarterly magazine.

“It was very disappointing when he pulled out of the team a couple days before the start of 2003 Cable and Wireless Test series against Australia,” Greenidge remarked.

“From reports of a person who said he was interested in West Indies cricket and was still willing to play on, it was a very sad blow and really a slap in the face of West Indies cricket which you are supposed to have so much great feeling for. This leaves me to think otherwise,” Greenidge wrote.

“I think what happened was in very bad taste, considering we are supposed to have such great love for West Indies cricket,” added the former West Indies opening batsman.

Greenidge, who hit 19 centuries and scored 7 558 runs in 108 Tests at an average of 44.72 to be the West Indies' fourth highest run-scorer, made it clear that Caribbean cricket is bigger than individuals and territorial concerns.

“There is no God-given right that anyone should be selected because of territorial feelings that he is a good player, certainly not in my view.

This is not an individual game. This is West Indies cricket and long after all of us are gone, West Indies cricket will remain,” noted Greenidge.

A seemingly fired-up Greenidge opined that “there is a lot of selfishness going on” in West Indies cricket.

“That is my honest view. It is like a victimisation of what is going on in West Indies cricket,” Greenidge said.

“We cannot be mindful of the West Indies cricket if we keep doing the things we are doing but we are still being supported. As a selector, I am not comfortable with that,” Greenidge remarked.

He also felt there it was “very undermining” for the Test series against Australia, which the West Indies lost 3-1.

“You are playing against the best team in the world and then just on the eve of matches, certain things are happening. I think it is in very bad taste of individuals, who are obviously not mindful of West Indies cricket,” Greenidge reasoned.

“It is a very selfish way of looking at it and regardless of who these persons are, I would like to say to them that they should make their intentions known very early so that we can make the necessary adjustments.