WI coach Sammy: 'This loss will not dampen our spirits'

Thu, Jun 20, '24

 

Daren Sammy told his West Indies team to put their eight-wicket loss to England "in the garbage" and insisted that they can still win an unprecedented third men's T20 World Cup.

West Indies set England 181 to win in St Lucia - at the ground bearing Sammy's name - but only took two wickets as the defending champions cruised home with 15 balls to spare, thanks primarily to Phil Salt and Jonny Bairstow's unbroken 97-run partnership for the third wicket. Sammy said that only on a flat pitch, his team were "about 25 runs short" of a winning total.

"It's part of the game," Sammy said. "This loss will not dampen our spirits. We still believe we've got a team that could win this World Cup, and that's what I'll tell the guys inside when I speak to them: park this game, put it in the garbage. And we move forward to Barbados where we win against the USA, and then we have South Africa in Antigua on Sunday.

"No-one said it was going to be easy. There are good teams in the tournament. Today, we came up against the defending champions and they got the better of us. But that doesn't mean our tournament is over. Our destiny is in our own hands, and I feel I've got the 15, the group of men, that we believe that this tournament, we could win."

Read more at ESPNcricinfo

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