‘I know this was coming’

With two more high-profile T20 leagues coming up, top West Indian players are set to be in great demand, and the situation has all the makings of a fresh scrap between the players and the team management, and, by extension, the cricket board. It might have begun already.

“It hurts,” Simmons said. “There’s no other way to put it. But what can you do? I don’t think that I should be begging people to play for their countries. I think if you want to represent West Indies, you will make yourself available.”

Due to all this, West Indies are far from getting their full crop of top T20I players together despite the T20 World Cup, which begins in Australia in mid-October, looming.

It appears, now, that some sort of breaking point might have been reached. According to Haynes, the West Indies management will give more weightage to performances in CWI-run tournaments, like the upcoming CPL, for selection.

“If there is a competition that is run by the West Indies (and) somebody is playing well, I think his name should really come up for selection,” Haynes said. “That performance is very important to us, and we didn’t say that we have picked the World Cup team yet, so all the games that are going to be played leading up to the World Cup, we must take into consideration.”

Russell and Narine, among others, are CPL regulars, so there is a chance that they might not be out of the fray for the T20 World Cup just yet.

“Things happen for a reason and hopefully in the future I’ll be wearing maroon again, but until then, I’d still love to play for Windies. We shall see when that opportunity comes, but there will never be a no for West Indies.”