West Indies keen to get going

West Indies take on New Zealand at Edgbaston tomorrow in what has effectively become the opening game of the NatWest Series after yesterday's washout at Old Trafford. The two teams last met at Port Elizabeth in the 2003 World Cup where New Zealand won by 20 runs. While only just over half of the current West Indies squad played in that game, eight of the New Zealanders who won that day are likely to play tomorrow.

While their recent one-day form means New Zealand are the better team on paper, their performances in the warm-up games have been far from convincing, and their confidence is low following their 3-0 defeat in the Test series against England. Though their batting has been impressive, with Stephen Fleming and Hamish Marshall both scoring hundreds, their much-touted one-day bowling strength has not yet been seen.

The injury to Shane Bond, the fast bowler, has hit them hard, but Daniel Vettori, who tore his hamstring during the second Test, is on the verge of returning to action. In any case, much will rest on the broad shoulders of Chris Cairns if New Zealand are to get the series off to a good start. Their back-up bowlers took only three wickets between them in last week's game against an under-strength Essex side, while Derbyshire had little trouble chasing a target of over 250.

West Indies, on the other hand, come into this game after some promising performances against Sussex and Kent. The batting is in good shape after successfully chasing 181 in 23 overs in a rain-shortened game at Hove, and Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Brian Lara are all in excellent form. Apart from a blip in the second match against Ireland, where Ravi Rampaul was carted for 74 from seven overs, the inexperienced bowling attack has performed well, though they will be weakened by the loss of Tino Best, who has picked up a niggling leg injury.

Lara, the West Indies captain, was keen that his side made a positive start. "We need to start in front," he said today. "We've been working on the mental side of the game to get the guys hyped up to win games. Our team is full of talent and we've got to make sure we harness that talent into something special."

Meanwhile, Sarwan told Sky Sports: "We have the Test series coming up and I think if we can do well in this tournament we can boost our confidence." He continued, "We played pretty well in the Caribbean, especially in the one-day form recently but it is different conditions here. We will take time to get used to conditions, but we will try and enjoy ourselves as much as possible."

However, there is a chance that no-one will be enjoying tomorrow very much considering the weather forecast. After the sun came out today, the bad weather may again arrive to spoil the party, as it did for the opening match between England and New Zealand. The outlook is not promising, with plenty of rain predicted.

New Zealand (possible) Stephen Fleming (capt), Nathan Astle, Hamish Marshall, Scott Styris, Craig McMillan, Chris Cairns, Brendon McCullum (wk), Chris Harris, Daniel Vettori, Daryl Tuffey, Ian Butler.

West Indies (possible) Chris Gayle, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Brian Lara (capt), Dwayne Smith, Dwayne Bravo, Ricardo Powell, Ridley Jacobs (wk), Darren Sammy, Ravi Rampaul, Jermaine Lawson.