LONDON, (Reuters) – Ottis Gibson has been granted permission to talk to West Indies about their vacant head coach’s job, the England and Wales Cricket Board said on its website (www.ecb.co.uk) yesterday.

Gibson, 40, has been coaching England’s fast bowlers since 2007 when he took over from Allan Donald first on a temporary and then permanent basis.

West Indies have been without a permanent head coach since John Dyson was sacked last August. Since then they have been led by former assistant coach David Williams.

Gibson, who was born in Barbados, played two Tests and 15 one-day internationals for his native West Indies.

He enjoyed a nomadic first-class career that took him to Glamorgan, Staffordshire and three South African provincial sides before returning to England with Leicestershire and then Durham.

England face West Indies in a group game at the Twenty20 World Cup in the Caribbean on May. 3.