10 Interesting Facts about T-20 Champions

I still remember an Indian advertisement of the 90s featuring the legendary Sir Viv Richards. In that advertisement Sir Viv Richards proudly claims that West Indies is famous for three things Cricket, Music and Pineapple.


Cricket definitely is what has made West Indies famous all over the world. West Indies cricket team popularly known as the Windies produced some of the all time cricketing greats.In the last decade the team struggled and cricketing pundits predicted that the present team will never win a major tournament.

The West Indies cricket team became the worthy winners of the ICC 2012 twenty20 world championship. This victory will definitely help in reviving cricket in the Caribbean.
Following are 10 interesting facts of West Indies Cricket and the winning team that might not be known to all the cricketing fans.
1.      West Indies is the only cricketing nation which is itself a multi-national team consisting of different countries in the Caribbean
region.
2.      Leeward Islands Cricket Association and Windward Islands Cricket Board of Control are the only regional/first class cricket teams in the world that consists of multiple nations.
3.       The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) developed an Insignia showing a palm tree and cricket stumps on an island with maroon background .This make Windies the only cricket team with a customized cricket flag!
4.      West Indies captain Darren Sammy became the first St Lucian to play Test cricket for the West Indies.
5.       Marlon Samuels who scored a match winning, career best, knock of 78 runs served a two year ban(2008-2010) by the ICC for “receiving money, or benefit or other reward that could bring him or the game of cricket into disrepute”
6.      The Stanford 20/20, West Indies domestic T20 tournament was promoted, financed and sponsored by Allen Stanford. The tournament was instrumental in popularizing T20 in the Caribbean .Stanford is presently serving a 110-year prison sentence for Ponzi scheme and fraud.
7.       In April 2012 ,West Indies star performer of the tournament, Chris Gayle returned to International cricket after an year absence because of dispute with the West Indian cricket board.
8.      West Indies winning team manager and former Captain Richie Richardson plays rhythm guitar for the band “The Big Bad Dread and the Bald” . The band members include the legendary Curtly Ambrose.
9.      Wicket Keeper batsmen Denesh Ramdin between the period May 2007 and May 2012, scored 1,332 runs from 45 Tests with a batting average of 18.76.Ramdin’s batting average is the lowest amongst all test teams in this period.
10.     Spin Bowler, Samuel Badree holds the record, world over, for best career economy rate in domestic T20.