Rookies in the role of main performers
Wouldn't it have been a help to West Indies' youngsters to have Ramnaresh Sarwan or Shivnarine Chanderpaul meeting them at the crease at some stage to rotate the strike, to deal with Saeed Ajmal and to take some of the pressure off them during the
Nikita Bastian
25-Feb-2013
Wouldn't it have been a help to West Indies' youngsters to have Ramnaresh Sarwan or Shivnarine Chanderpaul meeting them at the crease at some stage to rotate the strike, to deal with Saeed Ajmal and to take some of the pressure off them during the ODIs against Pakistan, asks Garth Wattley, writing in the Trinidad Express.
Skipper Darren Sammy, poor fellow, has not been able to be of such aid [as one of the discarded seniors could have] to his young charges, struggling as he is even more than them with bat and ball. Captain after captain over the last decade has said similar things [after a loss]. But, nowadays, the need to "make things happen" is urgent. Why? Because West Indies cricket is full of greenhorns as the cowboys of the old West would have said: young, undeveloped talent searching for direction but not yet finding it.
The exclusion all at once of the three most senior batsmen, Sarwan, Chanderpaul and Gayle has made an already bad situation worse. Good sense would suggest that such an imbalance be rectified by at least the re-introduction of Sarwan for the ODIs, and he and Chanders for the Tests.
Nikita Bastian is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo