How many other teams in Test cricket would Pakistan have given 117 overs, and more than a day’s play, to have a crack at a target of 329?

West Indies’ batting is a liability! The Caribbean side—which has had just one century-scoring no.3 over the last six years—is currently struggling to find an opening partner for captain Kraigg Brathwaite, while simultaneously featuring two batsmen potentially better suited in the no.6 position (Roston Chase & Jermaine Blackwood) in their top-five. However, instead of unwrapping all of the aforementioned, let’s focus exclusively on the no.4 position in this WINDIES batting line-up and why Chase is not the answer.

In the five years since his Test debut, Chase had previously batted in four positions; none higher than no.5. Yet, with South Africa’s arrival on Caribbean shores and Kyle Mayers’ fall down the order (resulting from his increased workload with the ball), Roston Chase was set for a new role in the top-four.

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In reply to CaribbeanCricket.com

Good analyst, Chase was basically opening the batting in the last two Tests. WI batting is so weak against the new ball, they should select three opening batsmen, but that would be impossible to find.

In reply to CaribbeanCricket.com

I love cricket that,s why I watch West Indies cricket, I am so sad that there are not one bats man you can say that today I am going to sit down and watch bat what the hell is going on we need a batting coach what happen to the passed bats men we have at home why can,t one be our batting coach why do we have to bring in some one from India who don,t know what the hell he is doing it is so sad to watch our cricketers go down like this none of them cannot even batt for a two hrs where is Bravo, where is Hope where is the rest the west indies selectors is leaving out to play players who went on a fluke tour in Ban and win a luke series. Don,t we have pride in our cricket anymore.

In reply to Frankie

It seems like the game has changed, almost no team can play good swing bowling. The WI higher order batsmen were poor,but Pakistan's higher order wasn't that much better. The ball in the series swung about more than I have seen it in the WI.

In reply to Frankie

Punctuation helps. Thumbs up emoji.

In reply to dayne

That's my point, in this modern cricketing era, with the ability of opening bowlers to swing the ball both ways, makes the opening position one of the most difficult position on any cricket team. Any batsman not willing to play positively will succomb to either LBW or catch in the slips. We might just have to use either Lewis, Simmons or Fletcher and give them licence to go after the opposing opening bowlers for WI to survive at this level.

In reply to CaribbeanCricket.com

err....good analysis. But you can't expect your no 4 to be coming in at 5-2 or 10 for 2. The problem is not Chase. The top order consistently fails....look at their averages

In reply to Jumpstart

Disagree.

Your specialist batsmen are just that. Batsmen.

Especially middle order batsmen. I agree that openers are somewhat of a genre of their own .

Chase and others cyah say we can only oerform, or be expected to perform when the score is 275 for 3 or 4.

Yuh picked to bat. Bat.

In reply to imusic

We don’t agree on much Itito but on this we do