On the heels of St George’s most recent failure to defeat Somerset at Cup Match voices imploring that the challengers institute a leadership and philosophical change have become louder.

One former St George’s player has noted the need for new people, top to bottom, including the selection of a captain with a greater level of maturity and strategic know-how in order that the club stand a better chance of winning the two-day affair.

Another past player did not call for any particular head to roll, but inferred that the club’s infrastructure, operational procedures and blueprint for seizing the trophy and ending the 12-year drought is flawed and in need of being revised.

Coach Clay Smith, though, was having none of such chatter.

Most damning of the present effort being put forth came from former star wicketkeeper and opening batter Dennis Wainwright, who declared the problem at the east as a matter of poor leadership.

This from someone who appeared in the midsummer spectacle 19 times, amassed 429 runs, recorded a record 37 dismissals — 26 catches, 11 stumpings — and was once the captain.

Wainwright played several years as the second-in-command to the legendary Calvin “Bummy” Symonds, viewed by many as the greatest Cup Match captain, before succeeding Symonds in 1970.

“We have to get some leadership, first and foremost,” was Wainwright’s blunt assessment. “This includes the captain [Onias Bascome] and the people in charge.

“The captain doesn’t have the knowledge for the position. “He goes to the game injured, whereby he can’t bowl, he doesn’t direct the team and has players doing exactly what they feel like doing.”

He highlighted the unsportsmanlike actions of Treadwell Gibbons Jr in response to being adjudged out leg-before to Dion Stovell during the home side’s second innings as partial proof of Bascome’s lack of authority over team-mates.

“Old-school Treadwell Gibbons would have never got into trouble like what he did,” asserted Wainwright.

“He would have been told before the game in no uncertain terms, because he’s done that before.”

Wainwright, who upon being named captain successfully advocated for the league and Cup Match captain being one and the same, seemed to walk back on this philosophy as he inferred the selection committee to have been erroneous in its continuance with the choice of leader.

Bascome has become low-lying fruit for critics of the club, having lost two games he has been in charge since taking over from Lionel Cann on July 22, 2021.

Among the results achieved include successive ten-wicket defeats.

Meanwhile, Allan Douglas Sr, another former St George’s Cup Match wicketkeeper, as well as radio commentator and the Bermuda Cricket Board high performance chairman spoke to a seeming disconnect between coach and captain, as well as a failing infrastructure.

“I’m questioning the connection,” said Douglas, who assumed the keeping duties from Wainwright in 1978. “Is it good? Is it reaping dividends?

“And the proof is in the pudding, so I’m not saying it’s that, but it’s something that they have to look at.

“My main thing is St George’s has to look at — and Somerset, too — their operation in totality.

“You have a scoreboard down there that guys built freehand, yet you can’t even have that operating, so you have three quarters of the field around here that can’t see the scoreboard.

“It’s that there. And then it’s OK not winning for a time, but where’s the plan for the future?

“Let people see that you’re doing something. Years ago, when they picked myself, Allen Richardson, Adrian King and Arnold Manders, there was Mr Caisey, Packwood, Mush who had a vision.

“So this is why I’m saying, ‘Let’s have a rethink.’ It’s not saying anything bad about St George’s, just sit back and have a rethink as to where we are.

“Let’s recalibrate, that’s all and don’t be afraid to do so. I find, very much when I talk to people throughout Bermuda, some people get so defensive. It’s not to be negative, but to reassess in order to get things positively moving forward.”

As mentioned, second-year coach Smith was in no mood to entertain armchair critics, regardless of pedigree and pledged to continue with the five-year plan he authored as a means of bringing St George’s back to prominence.

The coach vehemently defended his captain, even though he inherited him from predecessor and brother Wendell Smith, as he remained firmly in support of the 28-year-old son of former captain Herbie Bascome.

“I support my entire team 100 per cent,” said Smith. “It’s a process and we in St George’s realise this is a process.

“When I took over the role, I told them that this is going to be a five-year plan.

“You can’t expect just to beat a team like Somerset, who took licks and then took a decade to build their team.

“If you look back to when they spent 19 years before they were able to beat us, you can’t expect them to lose, lose, lose.

“After building such a strong team through all the years of losing, you can’t expect them to just roll over within two or three years.

“It’s going to take some time to defeat them because they are a well-oiled machine. I’m in my second year as head coach and when I took over I gave myself at least five years to try and make sure that we can win this cup back and be able to hold on to it.

“In doing so, I’ve emphasised and focused on giving some youngsters a chance to get some groundwork, because they need some exposure at this level before we can actually build, much like Somerset has done, create a dynasty to maintain the cup for the next ten years.

“It takes time to do that. I have the utmost respect for Allan and Dennis, but as they say, ‘Rome wasn’t built overnight’.

Smith pointed to several promising lights on a nearing horizon, the luminescence fuelled by a bevy of youngsters Smith believes to be maturing towards readiness for the big stage.

The likes of this year’s colt Azendé Furbert, Marcus Scotland, Nzari Paynter Q’Shai Darrell, Jarryd Richardson breed great hope for the future, with such optimism not mere wishful thinking but certain expectation.

“Our Colts Cup Match team has an abundance of talent and it’s just a matter of time before we see the fruits of their labour,” said Smith. “So, it’s going to take time.

“They’re still maturing and are perhaps two years away, in terms of staking their claims, and demonstrating their true quality at the top level and they need exposure as well.

“You can’t expect them to go in there one year and make major impact.

“You have to groom them and it takes time to groom these youngsters. It’s easy for people on the outside to say what they would do or whatever.

“As far as I’m concerned, my question to them is, ‘What have they won? What have they won? How do people become, all off a sudden cricket experts, when they’ve actually not won anything themselves?

“I don’t take anything they say on and I’ll just leave it at that.”