West Indies: Nortel - Mayers settling in for long haul (24 Jul 1998)

24 July 1998

Mayers settling in for long haul

The Barbados Nation

Antonio Mayers can seemingly do nothing wrong at the moment.

After the hullabaloo over his selection and non-selection for Septembers Commonwealth Games in Malaysia, Mayers, the Combined Schools North captain for the first time, responded by starting the 1998 Division 1 season with a half-century against Carlton.

And, after the frustration of the rain dominating the Nortel championship, Mayers started the reconstructed One-day tournament in impressive fashion.

His unbeaten 89 against the Windward Islands on Wednesday has been his best moment so far, but the previous day he enjoyed a fine all-round match against the Windwards, scoring 28, capturing three for 13 off seven overs with his medium-pace and hauling in a low slip catch.

There has been some criticism over the switching to the One-day competition, but Mayers welcomed the change.

I feel I would do a lot better because it is a more free-scoring game for me, he said.

The advice of others has helped him a lot.

I just tried to bat as long as possible. The coach was ringing in my head to bat, bat, bat for the 50 overs. At first I just wanted to see how the ball was coming on to me. I just assessed the spin and bounce and just fought it out.

Barbados manager Darnley Boxill was high in praise following Mayers innings on Wednesday.

Ive been talking to him quite a bit about not throwing his hand away. Hes been batting so well and that knock was a real gem. He used his head, played some beautiful shots, but he didnt get carried away as he normally would.

Source :: The Barbados Nation (https://www.nationnews.com/)