Michael Holding: "I won’t miss the game"

CHARLIE PETERS: The former West Indies bowler, winner of the Cricket Writers’ Club (CWC) Peter Smith Award, can't wait to end his association with a game that he has served with distinction for nearly half a century

Michael Holding has taken aim at cricket's governing bodies and claims he won't miss the sport upon entering retirement.

The former West Indies international, 67, recently confirmed his decision to step away from the commentary box after 31 years of service and has been honoured with the Cricket Writers’ Club (CWC) Peter Smith Award for outstanding contribution to the presentation of cricket to the public. 

In an acceptance interview with chair Alison Mitchell, Holding outlined his discontent with the modern game, which he believes has changed significantly since his playing heyday in the 1970s and 80s.

“I am very disappointed in the people who are running [the game] and the people managing it, and I won’t miss it when I go,” the Jamaican said.

“I’ll miss the friendships that I’ve made, I’ll miss the great people I work with, but I won’t miss the game, because this game is not the game that I started playing and the game that I knew. It’s different.” 

The England and Wales Cricket Board, in particular, came in for heavy criticism from Holding, who believes their decision to pull the planned tour of Pakistan with less than a month’s notice was poor.

The most powerful piece of sports broadcasting I can recall

“They were going for four days," he added. "Pakistan went to England before vaccines were available, for six or seven weeks. They stayed, they played their cricket, they were in this bubble, which I was in, and yes it wasn’t fantastic, but it was better than going out into society where we knew Covid was and without any vaccinations for anyone.

"And yet they stayed, they played, they honoured what England wanted them to honour, to save England’s butt, to put it mildly. So did the West Indies. And you have an opportunity now to try to repay to a small degree what Pakistan did."

Last summer, Holding took aim at the ECB's "lame" excuse for not taking a knee before matches, a gesture that was curtailed after the West Indies and Ireland tours.

And he feels the treatment of Pakistan and the explanation for the withdrawal is another example of the governing bodies' ineptitude.

^{Holding is calling time on 31 years in the commentary box, which followed a 15-year playing career}

“[The statement is] rubbish. I wouldn’t even pay attention to that statement, it doesn’t wash with me. I cannot even with those Mickey Mouse statements - no substance. Nobody wants to come forward and face up to anything because they know what they did was wrong, so they put out a statement and hide behind a statement.

"It just reminds me of the rubbish they did with Black Lives Matter. I won’t go back into that because I’ve said enough about that. But what that signal sends to me, is the same western arrogance. I will treat you how I feel like treating you, it doesn’t matter what you think, I’ll just do what I want. Four days in Pakistan? I’m absolutely sure they wouldn’t have done that to India, because India is rich and powerful.” 

The International Cricket Council also came in for criticism, for what veteran of 60 Tests and 102 one-day internationals called over-commercialising the sport.

“The ICC right now are a production company," Holding stated. "They manage their events, make a lot of money from their events, but they do not manage the game. This game is not being managed by the people responsible for managing the game.

"What they are trying to do is manage the money that the game can bring in, not the game – and that is very disappointing. I said this to my boss at Sky this summer. I said 'this great game that made me what I am, I am very disappointed in it, I am disappointed in the people running it, and I won’t miss it when I go.'"

The CWC judging panel praised Holding’s fight for equality in their citation, stating: “In the last 18 months, his searing words on racism and the Black Lives Matter movement have opened eyes and ears around the world."

Holding and fellow colleague Ebony Rainford-Brent, the ex-England women international, added cricket's voice to the BLM movement in 2020 with an inspirational video during the first England v West Indies Test that included their own experiences of racism and prejudice.

The video of the first-hand accounts received wide acclaim. Sky Sports won a BAFTA for their coverage and both were awarded Freedom of the City of London.

“I was not a very emotional person, per se," Holding explained of the compilation. "When I did commentary, I never got carried away, I was reasonably measured. When people heard me saying what I said and being so emotional, and getting so deeply involved, I think they realised that this man - who is almost blasé - to be getting involved and saying as much as this meant they had to listen. That was good, that people recognised what I was saying, and that they were happy to listen.”

He added: “I wish the politicians would be a little more open-minded and be a little bit more willing because they are the policymakers. They direct policy and a lot of policies we have in place need to change. A lot of the curriculums in schools need to change to reflect everything. Not just what suits one set of people. I think that’s where we need to appeal to those people, and for them to recognise that things need to change.”