West Indies coach Andre Coley says it has been a pretty steep learning curve for some of his batters against Australia’s attack, but he believes they are still in the game despite staring down the barrel of a heavy defeat on a challenging pitch in Adelaide.

A spectacular century from Travis Head looms as the difference between the two sides as Australia posted a first-innings lead of 95, which was set to be a lot less after Shamar Joseph took five wickets on debut to put the hosts under extreme pressure.

But all that pressure evaporated when Josh Hazlewood ripped through West Indies’ top order again to claim 4 for 2 at one stage and have West Indies reeling at 19 for 4. They lost two more to be six down at stumps still 22 behind Australia.

Despite 26 wickets falling in two days, Coley did not think the pitch was overly challenging for the batters and instead lamented his side’s decision-making despite showing good intent.

“The learning curve has been pretty steep for some of them,” Coley said after play on day two. “But if they were to sit back and some of the feedback has been, it hasn’t been tremendously difficult. It has been testing.

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In reply to CaribbeanCricket.com

Yep the "learning curve" has been steep for Kraigg and Tage who have toured Australia in the past.

Assessments like these ares exactly what is wrong with West Indies cricket. We continue to bury our heads in the sand instead of creating the enabling environment to impart proper techniques to our players.

The problems of West Indies cricket have been staring us in the face for nearly 3 decades, yet we are perpetually in denial mode.

Discourtsey says give our cricketers a fighting chance by giving them the tools to undertake the job.

As soon as the team was announced I said it would be a huge win if either of the tests lasted four days or we avoided an inning defeat in any. Well we still trail by 22 runs with only four wickets left.
So far Shamar Joseph, Justin Greaves and to a lesser extent Kirk McKenzie showed that they belong there but Arthanaze and Hodge in particular are far from being ready to play against quality bowlers. Hope they prove me wrong in the 2nd test

In reply to Sylobaby

You are making this analysis that Shamar Joseph and Greaves belong there after one Test Match. Wow. And that sums up one of the major problems with WI cricket. Too many fans live in the past.

Well, I guess Coley is being diplomatic, but many of the batters got out to poor choses of strokes, some players got out the same way twice. Let's see if there are any changes in the second Test, but I would not be surprised if there are not.

In reply to bobby

Yes, you are right because my analysis was based on the one match that they all played in . Shamar J looked like our Malcom Marshall, Greaves looked like he is ready to at least compete with Holder while McKenzie showed he is ready to play against good quality bowling. Athanaze and Hodge failed but I didn’t ask for them to be dropped but rather I challenged them to prove me wrong in the next test. Brathwaite, Chanderpaul and Da Silva also failed big time but they have proven that they belong there. So just want Hodge and Arthanaze to do the same

In reply to dayne

The only change I would make is Zachary McCaskie instead of Mottie. Really I thought that’s the team that would play the first test. I like Motie but since we are not playing at Sydney the wickets are not really too spinner friendly. So with three good quicks and Greave that bowls good medium pace plus we have Brathwaite, Hodge and Arthanaze to help with spin, I feel our batting looks very shallow so thus I would play the extra batter