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| March 4, 2003 | Tuesday | Zul Hijjah 30, 1423 |
Hooper wants ICC to look at Cup rules
KIMBERLEY (South Africa), March 3: West Indies captain Carl Hooper said cricket chiefs would have to look at changing World Cup rules on match forfeits and wash-outs after his team were knocked out of the tournament on Monday.
The twice former world champions now face Kenya in their final Group ‘B’ match in Kimberley on Tuesday.
“No disrespect to the Kenyans but they’ve more or less qualified for the second round because of New Zealand not going to Kenya,” Hooper told a news conference on Monday.
“It’s not the ideal situation and there were some politics involved, but I suppose the ICC (International Cricket Council) will still have to look into it.”
Kenya qualified for the second stage for the first time, collecting four free points when New Zealand refused to travel to Nairobi for security reasons.
West Indies, meanwhile, missed out on two certain points when their match against Bangladesh was abandoned because of rain. No reserve days were allowed for rain-affected games.
If West Indies win on Tuesday, they will finish the tournament two points behind Kenya with a superior run-rate.
“At the beginning of the World Cup it was in our hands whether we progressed or not, obviously there were some influences that affected us going through but we can’t look back at that,” Hooper added.
“The important thing is that in the crunch game against the Sri Lankans we weren’t up to scratch and we lost so we can’t just worry about people forfeiting games and rain and things like that, it’s sad but that’s the situation.”
Hooper said his team planned to take out their frustrations on the Kenyans to end on a positive note.
“The aim must be to win, and to win convincingly,” he said.
“Even though we’re out of the World Cup and we’re very disappointed, we’ve still got standards to maintain and the last thing we want to do is lose to Kenya.
“I think they’ve done really, really well. The victory against Sri Lanka was no mean feat, but...I still expect us to win.”
The West Indians still had a slim mathematical chance of making the Super Six after their loss to Sri Lanka but that ended when New Zealand defeated Canada on Monday.
West Indies were training at the time and Hooper was told the news by journalists at a press conference.
“The chances were very, very slim but we still had some hope. It’s been a very big blow to the team but we’ve got to try and look forward and take the positives from the tour,” he said.
“At no time did I ever consider we were going to be knocked out in the preliminary rounds, but...I think this is just a minor setback.
“This is something we’ve got to overcome because we’ve got a Test series against the Australians coming up and we have to regroup.”
Teams (from):
WEST INDIES: Carl Hooper (captain), Ridley Jacobs, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Pedro Collins, Corey Collymore, Mervyn Dillon, Vasbert Drakes, Chris Gayle, Marlon Samuels, Wavell Hinds, Brian Lara, Jermaine Lawson, Nixon McLean, Ricardo Powell, Ramnaresh Sarwan.
KENYA: Steve Tikolo (captain), Maurice Odumbe, Asif Karim, Alpesh Vadher, Ravindu Shah, Hitesh Modi, Brijal Patel, Martin Suji, Tony Suji, Thomas Odoyo, Kennedy Obuya, Joseph Angara, Peter Ongondo, David Obuya, Collins Obuya.
Umpires: David Shepherd (England) and Simon Taufel (Australia).
TV umpire: Kevan Barbour (Zimbabwe).
Match referee: Mike Procter (South Africa).—Reuters/AFP
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