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Timing was wrong, admits Hooper

Enigmatic Caribbean batsman Carl Hooper, who stunned West Indies cricket by announcing his retirement just before the team took off for the World Cup, has admitted that his sense of timing was off -- a strange admission from one of the sweetest timers of a cricket ball in the business.

"Looking at it, I should have retired after the last Test against Australia and given the selectors a chance to play someone in the seven one-days and then take him on to the World Cup," Hooper told the Barbados media.

"But I was hoping to get involved in the seven one-dayers and go on to the World Cup and call it quits after the World Cup -- but I just couldn't hold it."

Hooper has been replaced in the squad by young Jamaican all-rounder Ricardo Powell.

Hooper said that while his exit could have an impact, the team was still good enough to do well in England. "Lara will have to change plans and if I put myself in his shoes and I had somebody like Brian retiring on me, it would have been disappointing," he said. "But at the end of the day I had to weigh that up against somebody going out there and being one hundred per cent totally committed to West Indies' cause and I decided to retire."

Hooper plans to spend some time in England, being with the side in the dressing room and lending moral support.

"These are fellows that I have probably spent more time with than my family in the last 12 years, so there's no reason for me just to totally shut out and walk away. It is something that I can't really do, you know."

Agencies