But in the end it was spoilt by just one thing: the conspiracy by nearly everyone involved to keep West Indies players dependent on the likes of Bennett King.

First of all, we began talking about a draw before the start of the third day of play.

We repeated this throughout the third and fourth days to convince ourselves, then others who tuned in to keep up with the score on television or radio, that the pitch was conducive to nothing else.

We did that notwithstanding the efforts of Esaun Crandon, who rocked the stumps three times, trapped one batsman LBW, and had three caught out (including one at the wicket and one in slips).

In another part of the world, this would have been used as a benchmark for the others to measure up to in order to eek out a result from the game.

Everything about his bowling method in correlation to his line and length would have been analysed.

Instead, there was the constant drone about the pitch not giving too much, the perfect excuse for mediocrity and prolonged failure.

One commentator even scoffed at his countryman saying Crandon “certainly has never taken seven wickets before” as if to scorn Crandon for producing a fluke that did not prove him wrong about the pitch.

Next day, the fourth and final day of play, the general topic was how early the captains would call it a draw.

There was no mention of playing competitive cricket to the end.

No one talked about young bowlers using the opportunity to work a batsman out, regardless of the match result.

And don’t even think about a mention of the thought of making up for the sessions lost to rain.

There was none.

No one considered the fact that West Indies players have not been playing enough cricket in preparation for Test matches for as long as this slump has been going on.

We ignore the fact that last year’s schedule of at least 10 preliminary matches (two rounds of five) plus the semi-final and final were not enough to get us properly prepared for the tours by South Africa and Pakistan followed by our trips to Sri Lanka and Australia.

Of the 11 Test matches played after the 2005 regional series, we won one, drew two and lost eight (the breakdown, for the record: two losses and two defeats on the tour by South Africa, a win and loss from the tour by Pakistan, two defeats in the two-match tour to Sri Lanka and three defeats in the three-Test trip to Australia).

The one-day results were more woeful with five straight losses to South Africa, three to Pakistan and, in the Indian Oil Cup, two to India and one to Sri Lanka over whom there was a lone win for the year since the regional series.

So, reputation and recommendation formed the basis for selecting sides for the regional series; then, reputation and some outstanding performances formed the basis for selecting the Test team for the first home series; and that series decided the team for the next home series, then the first tour and so on.

It is quite unlike some countries that have a steady diet of county or state cricket competitions over several months backed by cricket academies that ensure a continuous flow of technically sound players to gain exposure for Test cricket.

Here in the West Indies, we play one season of just 10 matches (or 40 playing days), see the poor results and decide “this year we’ll play just five”.

The excuse is “finance” as if there were no boast last year that Digicel put a better offer on the table than Cable & Wireless that would now ensure us “bigger, better cricket”.

“The best thing for West Indies cricket,” they said.

There was much hullabaloo over paying the pool of players a guaranteed (US)$500,000 because (let me paraphrase here) it would dig into the yearly quota of Digicel’s sponsorship to the Board.

That is salary for 17 to 20 touring players.

Yet, there is no problem paying King and his two-man team twice that in salary for one year.

King did not make any public statements about the reduction in the regional series schedule and not much is being declared as far as what he is contributing to the overall development of the game here is concerned.

But it is at least comforting that Guyana’s Chetram Singh, the man who once had to decline the post of WICB president because of ICC regulations regarding his status as a bookmaker, has tabled the question of reviewing King’s worth to us.

That is interesting. He won’t get anywhere with it (even the great Alvin Corneal of “Corneal’s Comments” fame has had to concede “maybe a foreign coach is not such a bad thing”, because the masses’ love and respect for anything of European extract has brought results in World Cup qualification).

But it’s interesting.

Similarly, no one would get anywhere complaining about Beenhakker’s lack of serious involvement with anything local.

He was quoted saying this past week (by TTFF Media again) that sessions for the local players, which he supposedly came here exclusively for, were cancelled because of the unavailability of the four stadiums he cared to work in.

The Tobago stadium, he said, was out of the way for the players (ha! ha! ha! What a joke).

An art teacher once told me you have to step back to observe the substance of your work.

Once the authorities-that-be did, and saw the crap they were letting out, some other excuse was made and there he was training at the stadium with the local players -- making promises, even -- while cameras rolled.

The rest of the country holds him in way too much esteem to question his disregard for local players.

Not until a least four years down the road when fewer and fewer players are able to convince the Home Department in England, for instance, that they deserve a work permit to do in England what English players cannot do, would we see how Beenhakker’s disrespect for our talent pool has affected our game.

You see he has been given full responsibility for the direction of our players, a direction that has thus far taken them to various nations on their own accord to the detriment of a stronger home league.

What he is doing with it is inflicting a severe psychological scar by telling them the quality of local players is not good enough.

Further, when the World Cup comes and goes and local players can’t even as much as recognise the team as players they have ever played alongside, that would change many an attitude towards national team duty.

Call Bennett King to account, yes.

Review him.

But don’t leave so much in the hands of Leo Beenhakker.

We must use some of those millions we are calling for by the minute to put a proper development structure in place then put him to work in it, rather than have him dictate everything in some wild belief that everything he does must be right.

He must no longer be made to go around believing that he is here because no local coach is competent enough to do the job, but rather that we just preferred a Dutch touch this time around.

And finally, we must stop colluding with him to issue wild stories about whom we are going to play quickly followed by who we are not going to play after all, then which camp is on and which is off.

(It is happening so fast, one is left dizzy. And I wonder how this is being reflected in the $55 million budget submitted to government). That’s my view.