LONDON, CMC – Captain Jason Holder believes West Indies can still take a share of the five-match One-Day International series against England despite losing two of the first three games.
Speaking following the Caribbean side’s 124-run defeat at Bristol on Sunday, Holder said the Windies needed to execute better in the remaining games in order to take something away from the rubber.
“Definitely we can still square the series but we’ve got to take it step by step,” Holder said. “Our next encounter is at the Oval. It’s generally a pretty good surface there with some big boundaries. So we’ve got to be very spot on with our plans and make sure we execute them.”
West Indies were completely outplayed in the third ODI. Opting to bowl first, they allowed England to pile up 369 for nine off their 50 overs with Moeen Ali scoring England’s second fastest ever ODI hundred with 102 off 57 balls.
Test captain Joe Root struck 84 from 79 balls while all- rounder Ben Stokes chipped in with 73 off 63 deliveries.
West Indies had removed Stokes, Jos Buttler (2) and Root in the space of 17 balls with 11 runs added to reduce the hosts to 217 for six in the 35th over, to leave the contest in the balance.
But Moeen lashed seven fours and eight sixes in an astonishing assault to lift England to well beyond the 350-run mark, and put West Indies on the back foot. “We felt we were off to a decent start. We got the wickets with the new ball which we pride ourselves on.” Holder explained.
“Things started to leak a little bit then we pulled it back nicely with the couple wickets in the middle. I thought Miguel (Cummins) was outstanding in the middle overs coming back getting us those two prized wickets (Root and Buttler). We just didn’t finish off well in the end.” He added: “They bat deep. He (Moeen) played a special innings. We didn’t execute our plans towards him and he was able to capitalize on the dimensions of the ground. It’s a small ground and he backed himself to clear it. Having said that I don’t think we executed our plans.
“We didn’t field well. We were just a bit sloppy. There were a couple mis-fields [and] dropped chances. Having a day like this you really need to hold every chance.”
West Indies clash with England today in the fourth ODI before closing out the series two days later in Southampton at the Ageas Bowl. They opened the series last Tuesday with a seven-wicket defeat at Old Trafford in Manchester, with the second game in Nottingham rained off after just 14 deliveries last Thursday.
