A successful test of leadership

BY BRYAN DAVIS

IT was the former England cricket captain, Mike Brearley, in his book The Art of Captaincy, who said: “I have absolutely no doubt that a good captain gets other people to play better, puts the right bowlers on at the right times, gets the right balance between attack and defence, keeps people thinking about their input and helps give them confidence in themselves. A whole team can degenerate into hopelessness, or slight pessimism, or passivity, or go the other way to arrogance and complacency. Captaincy governs attitude.”

This is what Dwayne Bravo gave to his team, St Kitts & Nevis Patriots, in the just-completed Hero CPL T20 tournament. which they won. The first-time champions, in the ninth year of the competition, were given a winning attitude by their skipper through a dose of self-confidence and self-respect.

Bravo used the word “belief” to his charges very often, as he admitted in a post-match interview. He got the young ones to believe that they were the best, plus, they were no longer “emerging” players but mature, responsible cricketers who could face up to any situation presented to them on the cricket field. This is what good captains do. They build their squad into players who, because of this newfound self-assurance, would be happy and passionate to challenge any opposition and can’t wait to get on the field to compete for the fun of it and not have to worry whether they’re pleasing the captain or not. They would just be representing a team, playing the game they love, for the enjoyment of its essence. And that’s the stuff from which winners are created.

It depends so much on unity: all the players need to approach it as one team together, wanting to win. If the captain cannot do that, then they have no chance.

That’s what Sir Frank Worrell did in 1960/61. Sir Clive Lloyd followed suit in the eighties.

My congratulations to Bravo on his magnificent effort in bringing a side which is accustomed to losing, and was at the bottom of the pack in last year’s tournament, held in Trinidad, and leading them to the top, right into the winner’s circle. That is no mean feat, for sure.

The old adage “Don’t judge a book by its cover” is apt in the case of the Patriots cricket team of 2021. Although playing the tournament in St Kitts, there were no “home” advantages as such, for, apart from the fact that entrance to Warner Park was filtered to vaccination-only spectators, the social distancing and mask-wearing requirements would have been a deterrent. Then, of course, there were no participants from St Kitts & Nevis on the team.

Nonetheless, the team itself would not have brought any expectation of being champions. There were young, inexperienced T20 cricketers like Joshua Da Silva, Fabian Allen, Dominic Drakes and Sherfane Rutherford, as well as average players Jon Russ Jaggesar and Devon Thomas. Senior players Chris Gayle, Evin Lewis, Sheldon Cottrell and Rayad Emrit would have been there before, yet they placed last in 2020.

However, someone had the vision to bring in Dwayne Bravo who had been a winner four times out of eight competitions previously and is the most experienced T20 cricketer in the world. It was a masterstroke. They needed a leader and Bravo was the man. He shaped his squad and told them exactly what he wanted from them; then encouraged the young ones with praise and enthusiasm, allowing them to believe in themselves as winners. That is the impetus teams require in team sports, to have unity and back one another during the game. Even though everything seems to be going wrong, always back your teammate.

It isn’t a coincidence that when Bravo suffered a groin injury while bowling to St Lucia Kings on September 4, he had to leave the field – and it was the first game the Patriots lost. Gayle had taken over the captaincy. The following day, Gayle lost again to the same opposition. Once more, on September 8, they went under to Jamaica Tallawahs with Bravo still missing.

In a dramatic final, when one could not predict the winner until the final delivery was bowled, the 23-year-old Drakes kept his nerve and scored the winning single. What a moment. What a temperament.

What a positive mindset. Inspired by skipper Bravo. Captaincy governs attitude. Congratulations to St Kitts & Nevis Patriots, a side that proved they are true CPL champions 2021.