By Royston Alkins
National middle-order batman and West Indies `A’ team player, Vishaul `Cheesy’ Singh says that he is anticipating a return to last season’s form when the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) Professional Cricket League Regional four-day tournament resumes next month when Guyana will face Jamaica in Kingston.
The gritty left-hander told this newspaper that he is feeling great and was raring to go after a break during which Guyana participated in regional limited overs tournament.
“I’m feeling great heading into the second half. I’ve been doing a lot of work and I just feel I’m in the right place to take on the second half.”
The Georgetown Cricket Club (GCC) player will know that he has some work to do after an average start to the 2016/17 season. Singh, after five matches, has scored 175 runs with a solitary half century.
The left hander was in prolific form last season during which he scored 712 runs with three centuries and a half century. He subsequently earned his maiden West Indies `A’ call-up for a tour to Sri Lanka. Singh, on the Asia tour, had impressive returns racking up 324 runs from five innings with his highest score being 161.
When asked about his aspirations of playing for West Indies, Singh said: “My West Indies aspirations are simply to play Test cricket and to quickly adjust to playing at that level.”
He also admitted that he would have to work on a few areas to achieve that goal.
“I have just been working on getting myself in the right place. Getting my footwork right and working on a few other things that will make me feel comfortable batting at the crease,” he declared.
The 28-year-old, commenting on Guyana’s chances to cop another regional four-day title this year, said: “Our chances are very good. We are currently second and we have three overseas games where we have won at all those grounds in the last two seasons and we always back ourselves to defend our home ground.
“The team’s approach won’t change much from what you’ve seen in the last two seasons…the batting department put the runs on the board and back our bowlers to take 20 wickets simple,” he added commenting on the team’s tactics for the remaining five matches.
A few pundits, felt that Singh should have been in Guyana’s one-day team that failed to reach the semi-finals of the regional one-day tournament.
Asked whether he was disappointed at not being selected Singh said: “No, not disappointed. The selectors have their job to pick the best players they think will represent us well…won’t affect us going forward as we have different players coming into the squad with different energies.”
To date, Singh has played 39 first-class matches, scoring 2102 runs at an average of 33.36. He has scored some five centuries from the time he made his debut against Barbados some nine years ago.
