First things first, Mr Pres

Julian Hunte affirms that he has "hit the road running" as the fifth president of the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) since he gave up the vice-presidency nine years ago to become St.Lucia's ambassador to the United Nations.

West Indies cricket itself has done a lot of running in the interim but it has been mostly backwards and, as the organisation responsible for its administration, the WICB is seen as the brake that continues to hold it back.

In his acceptance speech at the WICB's AGM in Port-of-Spain last weekend, Hunte accurately identified the basic problem. "The WICB brand has diminished in value and is in desperate need of redefinition and revitalisation," he said.

Whatever the reasons that have led to the freefall from supreme world leaders 20 years ago to increasing insignificance - and they are myriad and well-documented - the bottom line is that the "brand", as Hunte puts it, has lost its once inimitable appeal. The reality is that no one wants a loser. Until West Indies start winning again (the latest count is 19 losses in the last 23 Tests), they will continue to be regarded as one of the game's also-rans.

During the current English season comments on television, radio and the press have pointedly contrasted the intriguing, competitiveness of the series against India with the preceding drab, one-sidedness of that against West Indies. In Australia two years ago, West Indies were posted for the first time to Hobart for one of the three Tests and missed out on either Melbourne or Sydney, certainties on the previous 12 tours of the country. One of the recent Tests in England was at Chester-le-Street, a new venue that had previously hosted only Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. The Oval, a must on previous visits, was allocated two Twenty20 Internationals instead.

Hentie van Wyk, treasurer of Cricket South Africa, announced last week that he expects a loss over the coming year "because of the teams that will be visiting South Africa". "Our money comes largely from the sale of television rights, and we can't charge as much for these rights when we have low profile teams visiting us," he explained.

Those teams for the 2007-08 season are New Zealand and West Indies.

As an ICC official put it to me last week, on the issue of the sizeable revenue once made from overseas tours, "the reason why the West Indies were able to profit so handsomely from them was because they were a bankable team, boards wanted them to tour and were happy to pay a premium for them to do so, the same is not now true".

Vic Wakeling, of Sky Television which has renegotiated its contract for the global sale of broadcasting rights for West Indies cricket, has made the obvious point that the team's faltering performances affect its marketability.

So the first task for Hunte and his board is to address what his predecessor, Ken Gordon, called "a tragedy of unfilled potential" and move to better ready the team for the assignments immediately ahead. More humiliation in the Test series in South Africa next December and January and at home against Sri Lanka and Australia next March through June would be too much to take.

The promised establishment by October of six Academies to fully develop the most promising players (the hub at UWI's Cave Hill campus in Barbados with five spokes in Guyana, Jamaica, the Leewards, Trinidad and Tobago and the Windwards), the new and made-over facilities through the World Cup and the WICB's improved financial status raise hope for long-term prospects.

The governance committee headed by PJ Patterson, the retired Jamaica prime minister, has already put down some relevant guidelines for the future - even if Hunte was at pains last weekend to state that he "definitely" did not share the view that the WICB had outlived its usefulness. But it is the present that should be the new president's priority for it is here that the WICB is again dragging its feet.

More than three months after Bennett King's resignation and a month prior to the Twenty20 World Championship in South Africa, a new head coach hasn't been named - nor, for that matter, an assistant. And no decision has been taken on the need for fielding and bowling coaches. Judging by the WICB website, which advises "sorry, there are no vacancies at this time", either there are no changes or, if there are, these positions have been already been filled. It would be helpful to know which.

In the meantime, Ramnaresh Sarwan has recommended a camp to prepare for the Twenty20, one tournament that the West Indies have as good a chance as any of winning. It seems a no-brainer but it hasn't been followed up by the WICB. The obligatory squad of 30 has been named, from whom the final 15 will be chosen, and it would be beneficial to get them together for practice, training and some competitive, internal matches for a couple of weeks leading up to the event.

Five or six such contests would surely bring crowds, say, to Kensington and create a little revenue. There is a gap of almost three months between the end of the Twenty20 and West Indies' return to South Africa for three Tests and five ODIs. It is time that best spent getting players ready, physically and mentally as much as technically, through another camp for a challenging tour.

An October start to the Carib Beer and KFC Cup competitions that had been hinted some months back by Tony Howard, the WICB's cricket operations manager, would add a competitive edge to preparations. Yet Chetram Singh, head of the Guyana board and a WICB director since Peter Short was president, told VOB Radio last week that even he didn't know what the dates were. It is such an absence of simple planning that has become a hallmark of WICB's operations.

The new president has a lot on his plate but the simple things first require his attention. The enhanced value of the West Indies name depends on it.