Twenty20 / Frank Gregan / 05 May 2010 / Leave a comment Bet Now View Market

Six wins on the trot isn't quite so impressive when you consider who the West Indies have played against recently and anything but a place in the final of the T20 World Cup will be seen as a massive disappointment for their cricket-mad fans, says Frank Gregan.

Ottis Gibson is learning that 'living the dream' is not all it's cracked up to be. He left his post as England's bowling coach in February to take charge of the West Indies and is already discovering that being the main man bears little resemblance to being just another cog on the coaching wheel.

West Indian cricket is in a worse mess than the Greek economy and like the Greek trade unions, the West Indian cricket fans that used to be renowned for their laid-back attitude and tolerance are ready to revolt.

Gibson has had his honeymoon period. He was handed a few 'gimmes' to get him on his way but it didn't work out quite how he would have liked it. A five match one-day series against Zimbabwe should have been a (weather permitting) whitewash but his team of underachieving stars managed to lose the first game by two runs.

They managed to get back on track, eventually winning the series 4-1 and consequently recording six straight victories. The bad news for Gibson was that in addition to the four Zimbabwe wins the other two 'scalps' were Canada and Ireland. Six wins on the trot is no big deal if you are playing cricket's equivalent of the Slug and Lettuce. As soon as the Windies came up against decent opposition (New Zealand in a Twenty20 World Cup warm up game) they folded like a poker player holding pocket threes being confronted with an ace-king-queen flop!

The West Indies are in the same qualifying group as England with the two scheduled to clash on Monday. Both sides are nailed on to make the Super Eights, wins against the Irish for the big two in the group will ensure that. However, should the West Indies fail against Paul Collingwood's men there is likely to be a media and supporter backlash. Their team's fall from grace has been rapid, the only format that they are holding their own in is Twenty20 and if they underachieve on home soil they will be subjected to dogs abuse.

Gibson will find out the hard way that 'command' is a lonely place. There will be a pyramid of criticism directed at the team but all of it funnels towards the top and the head coach. It's not only the "here and now" that will be the focus of attention, his past will be examined and his pedigree scrutinised. Sir Vivian Richards has already delved into his memory bank to give the Caribbean fans the benefit of his memory of Ottis Gibson the player.

Richards remembers:"I have one memory of Ottis Gibson, I remember one time a few years ago when West Indies were losing to South Africa and he was in the team. I saw the man who is now the coach of my team with his two feet on the balcony, earphones in, beer in hand and he was having fun listening to the music with West Indies just about to go down the chute."

Those are harsh comments but proof that one of the great names of West Indian cricket is feeling the same frustrations as the team's supporters. A once proud and successful cricketing organisation is in free-fall but the irony is, this West Indian side has an abundance of talent on paper. The old cliché about paper teams winning paper trophies is true. Gibson has got to get the best out of his squad and give the home supporters something to be proud of.

The only way they can stop the sniping is to win matches. Qualifying for the Super Eights will not be enough, making the semi-final is unlikely to hit the spot, Gibson's men need to at least reach the final and give themselves a real chance of being crowned champions if they are going to win back their supporters and their critics.

The West Indies have been traded as high as [8.8] to reach the final but a match in the region of [4.5] is currently about the best that's attainable.