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So the selectors and the directors have let bygones be bygones and there were plenty of bygones and handed the responsibility of the most demanding job in West Indian sport to Carl Hooper.

In a cricketing version of the biblical story of the prodigal son, they have forgiven the indiscretions of the past and have not only welcomed Hooper back to the fold, aged 34 and 14 years after they first picked him, but given him their highest post. The thoughts can only be surmised of those who stuck to the cause while Hooper was away and who developed an unwavering loyalty to Jimmy Adams, who has had to make way after a couple of disastrous series, both personally and for the team.

Gaining the trust and the loyalty of his players will be the new captain's most urgent, if not most difficult, task. No leader can effectively function without them, especially one at the helm of a sided lacking self-belief. Those who nominated and voted for him were clearly convinced by his deeds of the past couple of months that the Carl Hooper of 2001 is not the Carl Hooper who left them scrambling for a late replacement for the 1999 World Cup when he abruptly announced his retirement three weeks before the tournament.

They were obviously confident that their man is now not the one who never seemed comfortable with the responsibility of leadership or the methods of administrators.

If the teenaged Hooper gave up the Guyana Under-19 captaincy to concentrate on his batting and Hooper the county pro stepped down after losing his one and only match at the helm of Kent, in 1996, they have apparently seen in Hooper, the 2001 Guyana skipper, a fit, enthusiatic and inspirational leader. There are those who may remember that when he was previously appointed West Indies captain, to the Hong King Sixes tournament in 1997, he refused to play after a row with the organisers that had nothing to do with the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB).

But that was in the past, as was the 1995 tour of England when he was fined for leaving the team without permission and 1998 when he defied the instructions of manager Wes Hall and coach Malcolm Marshall to play for Guyana against the touring Englishmen.

His averages after 80 Tests of 33.76 as middle order batsman and 47.01 as off-spin bowler are patently well below the potential of a hugely talented cricketer.

The only way for him to have rebooted his Test career was to forcibly demonstrate a new consistency and he has done that several times over in the Busta Cup. Now he has to transfer that form to the Test arena against strong opponents against whom he could only average 23.7 with the bat and 46.5 with the ball the last time they met. If he can, it will be an enormous boost to his own position but more especially to a batting team that has frequently collapsed for bingo number scores.

Given the high expectations of those to whom Hooper has always been nothing less than a cricketing god and the misgivings of others who see him as an ordinary mortal with feet of clay, the pressure will be intense.

He follows Courtney Walsh, Brian Lara and Adams as the fourth captain in five years but the chopping and changing has made no difference to the West Indies' dismal overseas record of 18 defeats in their last 20 Tests.

The account is different at home where they have lost only one series in the past 27 years to Mark Taylor's Australians in 1995. So Hooper starts with a plus, especially as his first Test is in his hometown, Georgetown. He needs whatever help he can against opponents as tough as they come, who also carry the psychological advantage of a 5-0 whitewash in the previous series between the teams in South Africa two years ago.

If the West Indies falter under him, he will find little sympathy from either fans or selectors. As fate would have it, his opposing captain in the Shield final in Kingston yesterday was Adams who was moved to publicly plead with fans not to boo him.

Carl has come back and represented his country with distinction, Adams said. Due respect should be given to him as a player and as opposing captain.

It is the type of burden the captain of the West Indies cricket team has to bear. The old Hooper often baulked as such challenges. The latest evidence is that the new Hooper is made of sterner stuff. We hope so.

© The Barbados Nation