By Tony Cozier
In BRISTOL
THE big freeze of the northeast gave way to a day of clear, cloudless sunshine. But for a few degrees, it could have been Barbados.
What didn’t change in the second ODI yesterday was the lethargy of the West Indies team and the standard of their cricket.
It was as dismal as the weather they left behind in Chester-le-Street and Headingley, the mediocrity as blatant and as embarrassing as it had been in the preceding two Tests.
To have been bowled out with 11.3 overs unused in favourable conditions on a county ground with close boundaries short-changed spectators who poured in long before the first ball and filled the temporary stands to capacity.
A few hundred were West Indians, carrying their flags and wearing their maroon shirts in hope that they could inspire their team to renewed effort.
They all came expecting the enjoyment of a genuine contest on the first summery day of the cricket season. What they got was a mismatch, English romping home by six wickets with 14 overs in hand.
“They should still be playing now,” the man getting into the car next to mine told his wife who had clearly been summoned early to pick him up. “They were just pathetic.”
It was not too harsh a judgment. The reputation of West Indies cricket that was boosted here by the fight shown in the recent victorious series in the Caribbean has been shaken by events of the past few weeks. It is back to where it was in the not to distant bad, old days.
It was not to say that the West Indies were undone yesterday by quality bowling. The significant meltdown was caused by sheer carelessness, mainly against the uncomplicated, wicket-to-wicket medium-pace of Paul Collingwood, the Man of the Match.
James Anderson and Stuart Broad were as threatening at the start as they were in the Tests and Broad took care of the top and bottom. But the approach of Broad’s two early victims, Lendl Simmons, fourth ball, and Ramnaresh Sarwan, second ball, suggested they were warming up for next month’s World Twenty20 Championship rather than settling in for 50 overs after they were sent in.
Chris Gayle and Shivnarine Chanderpaul saw off the eager young fast men and were putting things back together when Andrew Strauss introduced Graham Swann’s off-spin in the final over of the initial 10-overs power play.
Gayle launched his first ball towards the town centre for his second six, swiped at the second and was bowled.
Just when Shivnarine Chanderpaul and the returning Dwayne Bravo were leading the team out of its early troubles with a stand of 63, Chanderpaul, untypically, topedged an ambitious pull off Tim Bresnan to be caught off a skier. Soon Bravo, playing superbly for 50 off 58 balls, missed a straight one from Collingwood and was bowled.
It exposed a fragile lower order that could manage only 32 from the last five wickets on Bravo’s dismissal. It was difficult to determine the most culpable of the remaining wickets. Not one of them appeared conscious of the need to bat out the overs.
With 20.3 available, Denesh Ramdin, back when he might have been forward, was plainly lbw.
Jerome Taylor attempted an impossible run as he pushed the ball 10 yards away and had no chance of regaining his ground, even if he hadn’t slipped. Another 19.2 overs remained.
With 14.5 overs left, Keiron Pollard slogged at Collingwood’s first ball after a drinks break as if it was the last ball, missed and was bowled. His status as an international cricketer is increasingly in doubt.
With 13.3 overs to go and the level-headed Darren Sammy at the opposite end, Sulieman Benn missed one wild swing at Broad and just managed to connect with the same shot next ball. It lobbed to mid-wicket.
It was in the final batting power-play but Benn didn’t seem to appreciate the important proviso that eight wickets were down. It was a lack of cricketing common sense that is so plain at all levels in the West Indies at present.
It was shocking cricket all round. Whether this tour was undertaken under duress or not, the players are being well paid for it. They are, supposedly, professionals. Once again, they played like club amateurs.