FROM 1959 when I first saw a West Indies team in Pakistan led by Gerry Alexander play a Test at a packed National Stadium in Karachi, to now, the islanders have passed through various phases of glory and gloom.

Their best era undoubtedly though being from the early 1970s when Clive Lloyd led the team and later Vivian Richards outfit outplayed almost every opposition.

Being fortunate to have stepped in as journalist in that period, I have witnessed their highs and lows in every format of the game, Test matches, World Cup triumphs or whatever or for that matter the charisma that men like Garfield Sobers, Rohan Kanhai, Alvin Kallicharran, Clive Lloyd, Viv Richards, Gordon Greenidge and Desmond Haynes had to offer.

The guile of the first spinner of history to take three hundred wickets Lance Gibbs from Guyana who once also took a hat-trick in a Lahore Test against Pakistan and then the fire and fury of men like Wesley Hall, Charlie Griffith, and later a long array of top-class pace merchants like Michael Holding, Joel Garner, Andy Roberts, Colin Croft, Courtney Walsh, Curtley Ambrose and the indomitable Malcolm Marshall obviously combined together to constitute what we knew of the West Indies.

From that period onwards, once the star performers left one by one and in a short period of time, the backup that was inducted over the years has been totally unable to match their predecessors’ league who held their heads high with pride.

Stories abound about their decline, their interest in basketball in America, islands’ rivalry, longstanding pay disputes, politics in the game and and other factors which have influenced their gradual decline and with it rankings.

Some like basketball are only a myth as I discovered from Andy Roberts recently and of course through the great Sir Viv Richards.

But politics, yes, has left the mark on them from which they are still to recover. Which indeed is sad and now shows up in the present make-up of the team touring the UAE under Jason Holder and is yet to win a match, of any format, against Pakistan.

Having badly lost the ODI and T20 series, they had their good and bad moments before they conceded the Test series in the first two Tests to trail 2-0 and now are faced up with the prospect of a whitewash which seems imminent unless they come up with a significantly improved show in the final Test here in Sharjah.

West Indies’ inconsistency with the bat with Darren Bravo, Marlon Samuels, Kraigg Brathwaite and Jermaine Blackwood occasionally showing some muscle has not really helped nor their bowling has been that impressive to pin Pakistan batsmen down.

In both matches Pakistan managed to pile up big scores to keep the pressure simmering for them.

Pakistan do hold a formidable record here in Sharjah and with the pitch as it looks things could turn out for Misbah-ul-Haq’s men as much positive as before.

Published in Dawn October 30th, 2016