West Indies out to boost bargaining power by winning Bangladesh series

West Indies head coach Darren Sammy wants his players to win the Bangladesh series in a bid to put them in strong position to negotiate with the board.
The Cricket West Indies had recently decided to impose 25 percent cut off International players retainer fees due to its financial, developmental and competitive crisis.

Sammy believes finishing Test Champion (WTC) cycle on high would hand the players a power to bargain with the board.

"If you look at the way we played in the India series when the news (about the pay cut) was put to the players and how they responded in that India series shows the drive, the passion, the willingness to help turn around West Indies cricket," Sammy said here today ahead of Bangladesh Test series.

 "I think there's reality and there's understanding where you are as a professional, as a board, and there's no secret where we are obviously financially.

Once a superpower of world cricket, West Indies cricket has been in downhill spiral apart from some occasional flashes of brilliance. In this current WTC cycle, they are ranked at eighth while Bangladesh are in fourth place. They finished at eighth in the last cycle also.

As Bangladesh series is their last in this cycle, Sammy believes there is lot to take from the series in a bid to improve their place in the WTC standing. 

"My word to the guys, especially this Test Championship, you finish in the top five there's extra incentives. ICC has invested a lot of money in the World Test Championships in terms of prize money, and it's an opportunity for our boys to come up from the number eight that we've finished in the last two cycles."

He also said the better performance would help sponsors draw their attention to the West Indies cricket.

"And what I've challenged the guys to do is to put ourselves in a better position to negotiate and attract sponsors by the performances we put on the field. And I thought the white-ball teams did that extremely well in India and hopefully we could do that as a red-ball team here in Bangladesh," he said.

Despite been in downhill spiral, West Indies' performance in cricket across the format is something to cheer up. They so far didn't lose any Test series in this year and also fought neck-to-neck with India on Indian soil in ODI and T20 series of late.

Sammy, however, believes the recent performance would inspire them win the Test series, despite knowing that Bangladesh are favourite at their own den always.�"BSS