Everyone is crying out for peace, yes,
None is crying out for justice.
I don’t want no peace,
I need equal rights and justice.
I need equal rights and justice.
I need equal rights and justice.
Got to get it! Equal rights and justice.
Cricket West Indies (CWI) selection panel has named a 25-man squad for the tour of England that is scheduled to start July 8.
The touring party includes a fourteen (14) man Test squad and a list of eleven (11) reserves for the proposed Sandals Tour of England 2020.
However, the exclusion of Guyanese Veersammy Permaul from the West Indies squad for the England tour is not only disheartening but also a grave injustice to the player.
It cannot be that the leading bowler in the Windies Regional Four-Day tournament with 50 wickets in eight matches, including three five-wicket hauls in an innings and two ten-wicket hauls in a match cannot make a Windies squad of 14, let alone a reserve list of 11.
Two things readily come to one’s mind here, one, the performance criteria are not worth the paper it is written on, and two the selectors are sleepwalking on the job.
The fact of the matter is the Windies is sending a wrong message when performance is punished rather than rewarded.
We see this same movie before, where players were not selected for either vindictive, political, or other inexplicable reasons.
The truth is Permaul should be told whether at the ripe “old age of 30,” he is being put out to pasture, or there are other reasons for his non-selection.
It was Lord Chief Justice Hewart in his attempt to quash a conviction in a case who said, “it is not merely of some importance but is of fundamental importance that justice should not only be done but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done.”
Any fair-minded person would agree that given Permaul’s body of work over the years, he deserves to be in the touring party’s on the trip to England, and even more so since he performed better than some of those who were selected.
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Tags: regional cricket, selectors, Windies