West Indies head coach, Phil Simmons is adamant that batsmen must score centuries while crediting their month-long camp for the victory in the first Test on Sunday over England.
Simmons fielded questions from Stabroek Sport via the team’s virtual press conference yesterday where he spoke about the batsmen converting half centuries into centuries moving forward in the three-Test series.
When asked about the areas he wanted to see improvement on following their four-wicket win, Simmons stated “I think definitely the fact that we had two guys getting sixties and a couple other guys getting 40s and not going to score hundreds.”
The head coach noted, “I like to see 100s in my scorecard at the end of an innings. I think that is something that we have to improve on.”
Simmons reasoned that had the half centuries been converted into tons, the game could have been won with a little more ease.
“If one of the guys who scored 60 went on to score 100 the game might have been easier for us going down to the end so we have to make sure batsmen score 100s and take games away from the opposition,” Simmons added.
Reflecting on the win, Jermaine Blackwood inspired the chase with a top score of 95 in the second innings while Kraigg Brathwaite (65), Shane Dowrich (61) and Roston Chase (47) piloted the first innings.
Nevertheless, Simmons labelled the match as “excellent” while deeming the victory as “a great win” that exemplified the hard work put in by the players.
“For me I think it was a great win because it signified a lot of hard work done by the players over the last four or five weeks because you don’t come to England and just win a Test match, I think when you look back at the five days of the Test match it was what I would say (was) a top class Test match. In all the days Test match cricket was played by both teams even coming down to the last hour, your bet could have gone either way so I think it was an excellent Test match and to come out on top is been great from us,” he said.
Simmons noted that the win was very important in avoiding the hardships of playing catch up against England in England.
He pointed out, “I think it is important because we don’t want to come behind chasing England in England so the chasing is from their point of view now. You guard against complacency by just trying to do the same things you did just before the first Test, trying to put all the measures before the first Test into place and let the players know we won a Test match but right now that Test match is history, we got to be thinking about Thursday and what we will be doing from Thursday to Sunday.”
Simmons contended that the month-long stint in the bio-secure venue orchestrated by the England Cricket Board was instrumental towards the victory. In that facility, West Indies were housed on site at the venue with an extended touring party that featured a total of 25 players.
When asked about the stint’s significance, Simmons responded “I think that has been the biggest influence on the performance.”
The head coach posited, “I think the fact that we have been here for that period of time, we’ve had quality bowling in the nets because we have 11 seamers here, you can’t put a price on that.”
The 57-year-old former all-rounder went on to weigh his experience while being a player and concluded that this method of preparation should be looked into.
“I think that is something we have to look at because I don’t like to go back in my days but I remember we would come to England and play three or four proper warm up games before the first Test and then we would also have three-day games or four-day games between Test matches so I think that period of training we had here goes a long way to how we performed in the first Test,” he stated.
