It has been a disappointing one year for Zimbabwe cricket since their fair outing in the World Cup 2015. Down Under, they challenged many a mighty opponent, giving them a run for their money. But what followed was a steep downward spiral. The retirement of Brendan Taylor - one of their best batsmen - hit them hard, but confidence from the World Cup should have given them enough motivation and ability to fight on. But it didn't. In eight One-Day International series since, Zimbabwe managed to win only one, beating Ireland 2-1, even losing to a spirited Afghanistan side. In as many Twenty20 International series, they lost five, two of which to Afghanistan, and drew the rest against Bangladesh and India.
"The senior players need to play a bit better, focus more at the job at hand and lead from the front." © Cricbuzz
Back in 1998-99, Alistair Campbell was at the helm of things when Zimbabwe saw an upsurge in their cricketing fortunes. They beat Pakistan to qualify for the subsequent World Cup, but plummeted soon after. He retired from international cricket in 2003, but returned as chairman of selectors during a revamp of the country's domestic structure in 2009-10, to lend a helping hand to the beleaguered board.
Six years later, when asked about the state of affairs in Zimbabwe cricket, like was seen throughout his career, he played it with a straight bat. "It's at the crossroads," Campbell told Cricbuzz. "It has been for a while now, jostling with getting more cricket and internal issues. The ICC ruling of having to qualify for the next World Cup if you're not a side in the top eight and having a side good enough to be able to do that. There are a lot of sides catching up now.
"Afghanistan is playing some really good cricket. They beat us 3-2 at home. You talk about Ireland, they've been the sort of guys that have been there and thereabouts to not having enough cricket, so those guys are coming up well and are challenging the likes of Zimbabwe. We haven't responded as well as we should've like Bangladesh have. With Bangladesh, we've all seen an upward curve. I don't think Zimbabwe cricket has been able to achieve that and that comes from a variety of reasons.
"The senior players need to play a bit better, focus more at the job at hand and lead from the front. There's too many guys who have underachieved and the need to look at themselves in the mirror. You talk about self-assessment and say, 'hold on, this is the plan', and not look too far ahead. We need to qualify. Realistically, we're not going to be in the top eight, so how are we going to come back to Bangladesh and win that tournament? That's really the bottomline," he said.
Whilst Campbell was articulate in his summation of the situation, there is a deeper engraved problem in the system with which Zimbabwe Cricket is being run at the moment - one which Campbell recognised and wanted to address during his tenure in the administration. "Our domestic structures, first-class and league cricket were something that I wanted to address and make arrangements to get those more competitive. Because, if it's not competitive and don't have vibrant development structures, then you don't have talent coming through. We're in desperate need of the likes of the (Tatenda) Taibus and (Hamilton) Masakadzas and those guys. We haven't seen enough of those coming through and when they do, one of the things we can't control, and unfortunately I don't know what the answer is, if we get a guy that's good enough and he chooses to go to England and play because he feels he's got better opportunities there, then it's a loss to us.
"At the moment, you have guys like Gary Ballance playing for England, Kyle Jarvis playing for Lancashire, you have the two Curran brothers... Sam, who's playing the Under-19 World Cup for England is one hell of a cricketer. We've lost a few to South Africa as well. Unfortunately, we can't do anything about that. I suppose the new generation of young kids don't really have that great allegiance to play for their countries. It's not about the green cap for them, it's about making a living."
A prime example of Zimbabwe losing out on their best cricketers to other counties and countries is Taylor, who retired from international cricket to opt to play for Nottinghamshire instead, after the prospect of a promising future. After playing 23 Tests, 167 ODIs and 25 T20Is and scoring over 7000 international runs, Taylor felt concerned about the future of Zimbabwe cricket and the administration side of it. "I felt people were not qualified enough to run Zimbabwe cricket officially and just the way we were treated as players," he