Faisal Hasnain on Fire in Babylon, the 2010 film about the great West Indies teams, and why a team's emotional bond with its people outlasts any contract.
A cricket team can carry far more than the hopes of its supporters. It can carry the pride of an entire region. That is the idea I keep coming back to when I think about Fire in Babylon, the 2010 documentary about the great West Indies sides of the 1970s and 80s, and it is why I think administrators should watch it as closely as fans do.
The film tells its story through archive footage, player interviews and a wonderful reggae soundtrack. It shows how cricket became an expression of Caribbean identity, dignity and resistance to racism. And what personalities it has: Clive Lloyd, Vivian Richards, Michael Holding. You almost feel sorry for the opposition.
Underneath the fast bowling and the magnificent batting sits a serious story about leadership. Lloyd's challenge was to bring players from different Caribbean territories together around a common purpose. Different backgrounds, different personalities, but one team.
The film makes clear why those victories mattered so much to people confronting racial prejudice and the legacy of colonialism. Winning on the field gave them something a scoreboard could never fully capture.
Success on the cricket field offered something a scoreboard could never fully capture, which is respect.
That is what makes the film so powerful. You can enjoy the cricket, but you also come away understanding the people behind it and the communities they represented.
Those of us in cricket administration spend plenty of time discussing broadcasting contracts, sponsorship and revenues. Those things obviously matter. But a team's greatest asset can also be the emotional bond it builds with its people.
The West Indies of that era had that bond in full. It was not manufactured by a marketing department. It came from a team that stood for something its supporters recognized as their own.
A team's greatest asset can also be the emotional bond it builds with its people.
Understand what you are responsible for. A cricket team can represent history, identity and belonging, and good administrators must protect that connection while building for the future.
The test is simple. Know your membership, and serve their best interests, not your own.
Know your membership and serve their best interests, not your own.
