West Indies cricket coach Dyson sacked

PORT OF SPAIN - Australian John Dyson has been axed as the West Indies head cricket coach.

Assistant coach David Williams will fill the vacant head coach role for the upcoming Champions Trophy tournament in South Africa.

The decision to sack Dyson was taken Wednesday at a meeting of the West Indies Cricket Board’s (WICB) executive committee, CMC reported here Friday. He had served two years of his three-year contract.

The Australian’s departure comes on the heels of the bitter impasse between the WICB and the players’ union, WIPA, which forced the 54-year-old to oversee a makeshift Windies squad for the recently concluded two-Test, three one-day international series against Bangladesh.

West Indies, comprising several young, inexperienced batsmen, were whitewashed in both series.

Dyson’s axing comes as yet another blow to an already troubled regional cricket fraternity, still reeling from the after-effects of the players’ strike that robbed the region of the marquee Windies players for the Bangladesh series.

The former Australia opener, who played 30 Tests between 1977 and 1984, was appointed Windies coach in October 2007 after the resignation of fellow countryman Bennett King following the Cricket World Cup in the Caribbean.

Like his predecessors, Dyson failed to find any major success with a struggling Windies side, despite winning his first Test in charge against South Africa at Port Elizabeth in December 2007.

His only series win was a 1-0 triumph over England earlier this year in the Caribbean that saw West Indies recapture the Wisden Trophy after a nine-year wait.

Dyson was West Indies’ fourth coach since 2000, following the appointments of Roger Harper, Gus Logie and King.