Chairman of Selectors, Rayon Griffith, believes underpermance by the top order batsmen and fast bowlers, coupled with a less than impressive fielding effort, contributed to Guyana Jaguars surrendering this year’s West Indies Championship title.
The West Indies women’s assistant coach said that the team failed to perform the way it used to.
“I would say we didn’t perform the way we normally perform. The team was holding on until the sixth round and I think the drawn match against Leewards and the loss against Barbados really pushed us back,” he said.
Griffith said although the team is unable to win the championship, it still has to try to maintain the standard of cricket it is known for.
“Even with the standings we aren’t too far away from Trinidad. We already can’t win the competition, but we still have to play our best cricket and actually maintain our standard of cricket we have played for this country over the last six years.”
The five-time, defending champions, are currently in fourth position, tied on points with Jamaica Scorpions who have 91.8 points but with an inferior net run rate. Trinidad and Tobago Red Force sits in second place with 94.6 points while Barbados Pride leads with 134.8 points after eight rounds.
“This is not one of our years. We did well over the last five years and it’s just that we didn’t capitalize on some of the key areas like the foundation when it comes to batting this year. I think the (numbers) one to four batsmen didn’t set up the game and that pegged us back from making those big totals in the first innings. We only had three 300 plus scores and we won two of those games and it shows when you score heavily what happens,” Griffith said.
He said that none of the Jaguars batsmen are in the top seven run-getters this season which reflects their underperformance this season.
Leon Johnson is the team’s leading scorer with 472 runs while Christopher Barnwell is the only other batsman with over 400 runs. Both batsmen have one century each and two fifties.
Griffith said that those scores were not enough with the top five batsmen in the competition scoring over 500 runs each. Jermaine Blackwood leads the table with 768 runs while hitting six fifties and a double century. Kyle Mayers scored two tons and five half-centuries in his 654 aggregate while Devon Smith has 649 runs with four fifties and one ton. Nkrumah Bonner scored two fifties and two centuries to bring his tally to 523.
Guyana Jaguars openers, Chandrapaul Hemraj (329) and Tagenarine Chanderpaul (315) along with Vishaul Singh (381) have three fifties each with no triple-figure score. Griffith concluded that the batsmen were inconsistent.
Chanderpaul has a highest score of 12 in his last nine innings while Singh has been dismissed for single figure scores in six of his 13 innings.
Griffith also pointed out that the lower order batsmen too underperformed.
He said that Clinton Pestano, Raymon Reifer and Romario Shepherd all made healthy contributions in the past while Anthony Bramble was the team’s leading run getter last season with 580 runs.
The former national fast bowler also compared the contributions of the fast bowlers to the Barbados Pride fast men this season.
“With the fast bowlers, they did well for many years and I think this year we didn’t do that well. Going back, last year we had over 100 fast bowling wickets and this year we have near around half of that and I think that is where Barbados have the edge over the competition because they have three fast bowlers with around 30 wickets each,” Griffith stated.
Last season, the Jaguars seamers took 126 wickets but they have only taken 64 this season. Nial Smith leads the way with 20, Reifer has 16 and Keon Joseph, a dozen.
Of the Pride trio, Chemar Holder has 36, Kemar Roach 30 and Keon Harding 29.
The three are among the top seven bowlers of the tournament. That table is led by Guyanese left-arm spinner, Veerasammy Permaul who has 50 wickets so far.
Meanwhile, the 41-year-old also pointed out that the fielding department also did not do justice to its capabilities, highlighting this year the fielding seemed to be below standard. He pointed out that the slip cordon, in particular, did not step up as they did in the previous years.
Heading into the final two matches, Griffith said that the goal will be to finish in the best possible position while giving some younger players a chance to develop.
“Going forward for the last two games I think we have some time off due to the coronavirus and I think that definitely needs to go away before we resume but I think we, the coaches, selectors and management need to sit down and assess the way forward…I saw a lot of people suggesting changes and so but at the end of the day, we still have our job to do and try to maintain that standard of cricket we are accustomed to producing…Not every time things go your way and if you look at it the team didn’t do so badly but at the end of the day we have to try come out in a good position and try to develop the young players…,” he stated.
