The Independent Voice of West Indies Cricket
England needs to come up with a batting display reminiscent of the post-1999 West Indies if the Test match at Port of Spain is to turn in favor of the home side.
At the end of a truncated second day, England are 54/2 in response to West Indies? 208.
The West Indies are losing the battle off the field as well during the current English cricket tour of the Caribbean. On day one of the Second Test in Trinidad, the local media, and in particular, the Trinidad and Tobago contingent were once again made to feel like second class citizens, in their own country to boot.
In a scandalous act, made worse by the absence of any defence by media representatives, local sports journalists were shoved crammed like sardines in a Brunswick tin and others pushed to the rear of a media booth. For the entire match, the local media is being forced to stare at the backs of the foreign newsmen, mainly from England and Australia.
The West Indian top order has done it again. A great start, provided by Chris Gayle?s flashing blade and Devon Smith?s support, has been squandered in the space of a few minutes.
The morning session of the second belonged to Gayle, who scored a rapid 62. Just before lunch, however, after a change of ends by Harmison, Gayle needlessly tried to run one down to third man and edged a catch to the keeper. Gayle played his usual rousing shots, but his weakness outside the off stump continues.
In a previous column, I argued that Gayle, Sarwan and Chanderpaul deserved to be penalised, perhaps by being dropped, for the West Indian debacle at Sabina Park. A look at their statistics showed that, although their averages and aggregate was not really bad, their failure rate seemed rather high for Test level top order batsmen.
Was this really true? Do the West Indian top order batsmen under-perform compared to their peers in world cricket? Are they merely putting in performances that are acceptable only compared to the low standards of their own teammates?
The shock of seeing the team announced for the second test against England was perhaps greater than that of seeing the West Indies fold for 47 in a single session at Sabina Park. At first glance, one would have been forgiven for thinking that West Indies won the first Test, and were merely replacing Fidel Edwards because he was injured.
Teams get altered not simply because some changes are obligatory. Some changes are made to make a statement. Given the West Indian performances recently, especially the all-time low at Sabina, what was needed was definitely a strong statement.