With question marks continuously surrounding the techniques of several of the West Indies top-order batsmen, one former outstanding first class cricketer has offered himself and his academy to assist the struggling batting unit.In fact, former Barbados allrounder Franklyn Stephenson is now the second highly qualified cricketer over the past months to have signalled a desire to assist West Indies batsmen with their faulty techniques. Former Barbados and West Indies opening great Desmond Haynes who formed arguably the best opening pair in Test cricket history with Sir Gordon Greenidge, has previously been snubbed by Cricket West Indies (CWI) as the team’s batting coach.Nonetheless, Stephenson, who has been a coach for many years, put forth himself and at the same time criticised CWI’s decision last December to hire Indian Monty Desai as the batting coach for the team. Desai, who has never played international cricket, is currently with the West Indies squad in Jamaica and together with coach Phil Simmons has been trying to sort out the regional side’s batting issues.
