PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Enterprising Trinidadian top order batsman Lendl Simmons said he was surprised at his axing from the West Indies team to face India in the four-match one-day series but has promised to bounce back strongly.
The 24-year old right-hander, one of the standout players for the regional side in the ICC World Twenty20 Championship, was a startling omission from the 13-man squad announced for the series which bowled off in Jamaica last Friday.
“I am surprised by the fact that I have not been selected to play in the current series against India. My form is pretty good at the moment and I would have liked to play against the Indians,” said Simmons.
“However, this is part of life and I am just going to take it in stride and work harder to get back on the team.”
In explaining Simmons’ omission from the squad last week, West Indies captain Chris Gayle said that the team had been selected prior to the World T20s and pointed out that Simmons had not done well on the preceding leg of the England tour.
Simmons played a single ODI on the tour of England, failing to score in West Indies’ six-wicket loss in the second game of the three-match series at Bristol in May.
In the preceding two Tests, he had scores of 16, 21, 8 and 10 as the regional side’s batting failed miserably in both matches leading to heavy defeats.
“I struggled in the Test series against the English basically because of the conditions. I am a much better player now after the experience of playing Test cricket in England,” he pointed out.
“A number of our players struggled to come to terms with the conditions across there and I guess we will all learn from the experience. The conditions there did not really suit our batting but next time we are sure to give a better account of ourselves.”
Simmons left on Monday for Barbados where he will represent West Indies “A” against the touring Bangladeshis in a three-day match at Kensington Oval starting Friday.
Following on from his magnificent 282 against England earlier this year in a similar fixture, Simmons said he was looking forward to another good score this weekend with the two-Test series against Bangladesh starting next week.
“I am hoping to get a good score against Bangladesh in the warm-up game to force my way back into the West Indies Test side and hopefully things can get better from there on,” he noted.
“I am working hard at my game and feeling good about my cricket presently.”
Simmons had only been recalled to the Windies team for the series against England in the Caribbean earlier this year, and managed a half-century in the first ODI in Guyana.
He made his Test debut in the final Test against England at the Queen’s Park Oval here in March.
