Former Guyana First-Class player, Garfield Charles, says that he is disappointed with the lack of fight shown by the West Indians on their recent tour to New Zealand.
On the other hand, he also said that he was happy to see the prospects of Chemar Holder.
According to Charles, who now resides in the Kiwi nation, “I was disappointed with the fact that we didn’t compete harder. My hope was that we would compete harder…we couldn’t fight, when we bowled well, we dropped catches and when we batted we didn’t bat well, the top order never showed any resistance, we didn’t bowl as well as we could.”
The 57-year-old former pacer gave his analysis of the performance in the two Tests during a recent interview on Mason and Guest radio programme.
He stated, “I was quite disappointed with the top order display, we had glimpses of guys who sort of looked as if they came to fight but not enough of it and we never put together a complete performance in any day much less in any innings and if you want to win games you’ve got to go with the momentum shifts in the game.”
West Indies surrendered the Test series by an innings and runs in both matches despite the absence of Kane Williamson for the second match, having scored a double century in the first.
Charles reasoned that Williamson’s presence in the first Test made the difference and with him out of the picture, the bowlers should have been pumped.
He admitted that the pacers did capitalize early in the script but having dropped Henry Nicholls four times before any substantial score saw the match slip out of their hands as he went on to make a massive ton.
Nevertheless, the Essequibo-born quick argued, “I thought the bowlers in the first test just missed their length. They should have bowled a tad fuller and give the ball a chance to do something but most of the bowlers sort of held their own.”
Charles singled out Shannon Gabriel and Chemar Holder as two positive points from the bowling perspective while identifying the captain, Jason Holder as one of the main culprits guilty of missing his length.
“I think Gabriel had a good series, he bowled with good pace and had good rewards, I think all the bowlers did well, Jason Holder probably was most guilty of not bowling the right length, he does have the ability to swing the ball…[I was] very impressed with the debutant, Chemar Holder, I just love the easy and smooth pace and he’s got good wrist action so in the future I don’t see no reason why he shouldn’t be able to move the ball around in conditions especially like around here [New Zealand].”
