West Indies gear up for a tough tour

The West Indies management has come up with a novel way of beating the jet lag for their team that is the inevitable upshot of flying half-way across the world to get to Australia. It is to get them immediately into training and practice as if their 30-hours journey was no more than a hop from Barbados to Trinidad.

Only hours after their arrival in Brisbane on Friday morning, the initial batch of 11 who flew in from the Caribbean, via London, were in the hotel swimming pool loosening up under the direction of fitness coordinator Bryce Cavanaugh. That workout was followed by a fielding session at the Allan Border Field, where they open their tour on Thursday with a four-day match against Queensland, and light work in the gym. The intensity was increased yesterday with an all-day session of net practice, fielding drills and gym work at the same venue from nine a.m. to five p.m., breaking only for lunch.

"The idea is to get everyone's sleeping patterns right, to coincide with the clock in Australia," manager Tony Howard explained. "Once they're kept active during the day, they can have a long and good night's sleep. We'll judge the results tomorrow (Sunday) but so far it seems to have had the desired effect."

Even Chris Gayle and Wavell Hinds, who arrived on an early morning flight, were involved in yesterday's all-day practice. They were granted leave to remain a day longer in Kingston for personal reasons. Devon Smith, who came in on Friday night following his delayed connection out of Grenada, and Brian Lara, who joined the team from Sydney where he played for the World team in last week's Super Test against Australia, also joined the practice.

Howard described facilities at the Allan Border Field as "excellent". "There was a bowling machine in each net, the pitches were good and the gym more than adequate."

With his contacts in Brisbane, where he coached Queensland for three seasons and headed the Australian Cricket Academy before taking up the West Indies post a year ago, Bennett King has lined up local players to assist in net practice. With club matches on, none was available yesterday but they are expected to join the sessions from today.

King said on arrival that he was especially keen to recruit legspinners to give the West Indies batsmen practice in anticipation of their forthcoming confrontations with Shane Warne and, increasingly likely, Stuart MacGill in the three Tests.

MacGill was not fazed by King's plan. "It's all very well having young leg-spinners or even established leg-spinners bowling to you in the nets but, realistically speaking, when it comes to facing a particular bowler, there's nothing like getting out in the middle and holding your breath," he told The Australian newspaper.

Support for his inclusion alongside Warne in Australia's starting XI for the first Test at Brisbane's Gabba continues to grow. Trevor Bayliss, who is coach of MacGill's New South Wales team, based his endorsement on what he saw as the West Indies' traditional weakness against wrist spin. He cited the successes of Bob Holland in the 1980s and Michael Bevan, with his occasional left-arm chinamen and googlies, in Adelaide eight years ago.

"He [MacGill] bowls a lot of wrong 'uns and West Indies have shown in the past they don't pick the leg-spinners as well when they bowl wrong 'uns."

MacGill played alongside Warne in the first three of the four Tests in the West Indies in 1999 and it was Warne who was dropped for the last. But last week's Super Test was only their tenth in the same team. While West Indies were busy getting ready for their tour at the Allan Border Field, the Queensland team they meet prior to the first Test were defeating Tasmania by two wickets in a one-day ING Cup match a few miles away at the Gabba.

Matthew Hayden, Shane Watson, Andrew Symonds and Andy Bichel were the Australian caps in Queensland's XI. All are expected to turn out against West Indies, providing a tough lead-up to the first Test.