By Tony (McWatt) and Reds (Perreira)
From its first session to the last the eventual outcome of the November 21-25 Sri Lanka-West Indies 1st Test played at the Galle International Stadium, was somewhat predictable, the hosts winning by the very comfortable margin of 187 runs. Sri Lanka’s victory was a continuation of its record of never having lost a Test Match to the West Indies on home soil. For the West Indies, the eventual margin of defeat was much more respectable than seemed likely when their second innings was tottering at 18-6 in pursuit of the 386 victory target they had been set by their Sri Lankan hosts.
From our perspective, the predictability of the West Indies’ eventual loss was evidenced almost halfway through the encounter. The debatable selections for the playing XI, the increasingly apparent ineptitudes of the two frontline spinners chosen to lead its bowling attack, and the wanting techniques of its top-order batsmen all contributed individually and collectively to the West Indies’ demise.
The West Indies chose to enter the Test with a bowling attack comprised of Shannon Gabriel’s outright pace and Jason Holder’s medium pace as the primary seamers. The spin trio of off-spinners Rakheem Cornwall and Roston Chase, together with the left-arm spinner Jommel Warrican’s were, however, expected to do the damage in delivering the goods of capturing the 20 Sri Lanka wickets required to win the Test!
The choice of Gabriel with injury-induced lack of Test match playing time, over the ever-reliable Kemar Roach or even the demonstratively very promising Jayden Seales, to lead the bowling attack was highly debatable. So too was the decision to play three spinners at the expense of a second seamer.
As it turned out Gabriel captured only two wickets in the entire match, Cornwall the same number and Warrican five in total. Warrican’s three first innings wickets, however, were all those of Sri Lanka’s lower-order batsmen. His two second innings wickets, those of Oshada Fernando batting at three and the number five Dhananjaya de Silva, were both taken against batsmen on the hunt for quick runs, not being at all choosy with their shot selections.
Having bowled wicketless in Sri Lanka’s formidable 386 run first innings total, Cornwall had early success in their second. He captured the wicket of Pathum Nissanka (3) in only his second over and when the score was just three. It wasn’t until 158 runs later by which time Sri Lanka’s total had progressed to 162 that he would capture his second victim of both the innings and the entire match.
The wholly inadequate performances of Cornwall and Warrican were in stark contrast to the outstanding off-spin bowling of Royston Chase, supposedly the West Indies’ backup spinner. Chase had figures of 5-83/28.5 overs in Sri Lanka’s first innings for his fourth five-wicket haul in Tests. Inexplicably in Sri Lanka’s second innings, Chase only bowled 6 overs while Cornwall’s wicketless 27 overs first innings off-spin was again preferred for 15.5 overs.
The inability of both Cornwall and Warrican to be anywhere close to as effective as Sri Lanka’s spinners on the benevolent Galle Stadium pitch should now establish once and for all, and in the minds of all concerned, their inadequacies as Test match bowlers. The same pitch on which they toiled so ineffectively to capture a mere 7 wickets from 83.5 collective overs became a virtual minefield when Sri Lanka’s spinners were in operation.
Except for Suranga Lakmal having dismissed Cornwall in the West Indies’ first innings, every one of the remaining 19 wickets taken by Sri Lanka to win the Test was from its spinners. They only required a total of 156.5 overs to run through the entire West Indies batting order, top, middle and bottom, twice by midway on the Test’s final day.
Except for Joshua DaSilva in both innings, Jason Holder in the first and Nkrumah Bonner in the second, the inability of the West Indies batsmen to play top-class spin was repeatedly and embarrassingly exposed. Were it not for Bonner and DaSilva’s second innings resistance in posting a 100 run partnership for the seventh wicket to help the West Indies recover from its precarious 18-6, the level of experienced embarrassment could well have assumed monumental proportions!
One of the primary factors in the West Indies’ inept batting displays throughout the Test, they also lost 5 wickets for just 54 runs in the first innings, was their inability to differentiate between turning deliveries and those which straightened from the bowler’s arm. In the West Indies second innings Shai Hope, Roston Chase, Kyle Mayers, and Jason Holder were all undone by playing for turn against straighter deliveries.
In contrast to the likes of England’s Joe Root, Johnny Bairstow and Dan Lawrence, not to mention a certain gentleman by the name of Brian Lara, who had all effectively utilized the sweep shot against Sri Lanka spinners during previous tours, none of the West Indies batsmen were seemingly inclined to try that stroke. Lara’s use of the sweep shot was a major factor in the 688 runs he had compiled during the 2001 Series in Sri Lanka and against the off-spin bowling of Muttiah Muralitharan in particular.
Another key component of the West Indies batsmen’s wanting techniques was their demonstrated failures to use their wrists to strike balls to the right or left and away from Sri Lanka’s fielders, instead of directly at them as occurred far too often. Much of successful Test cricket batting is about putting pressure on opposing bowlers by constantly rotating the strike, thereby forcing them to have to be changing their lines and lengths instead of getting into a grove from being able to bowl at the same batsman repeatedly.
There were well in excess of 350 dot balls in the West Indies’ first innings total of 230. Had half of those been better placed as to produce singles, the total would have been a far more respectable 355, and the eventual result of the Test might not have been so nearly as predictable as it turned out to be.
With the Series’ second Test scheduled to start on Monday, November 29, it will be very interesting to see what the West Indies on-site think tank comes up with in terms of their selections for the final XI. Reports out of Sri Lanka indicate that Jeremy Solanzo, who was replaced by Shai Hope during the first test as a result of the concussion injury he suffered, will in all likelihood remain unavailable for selection.
If so, that would most likely result in the West Indies fielding an unchanged batting lineup. There should, however, be some changes to the bowling with both Cornwall and Warrican making way for Keymar Roach and Jayden Seales. This would be our suggestion by way of the West Indies returning to its traditional core strength of playing four seamers, Gabriel, Roach, Seales, and Holder with Chase offering support as the solitary front line spinner.
As events surrounding West Indies’ cricket have within most recent times, however, repeatedly demonstrated, very little ever happens as it should!
About The Writers:
Guyana-born, Toronto-based, Tony McWatt is the Publisher of both the WI Wickets and Wickets monthly online cricket magazines that are respectively targeted towards Caribbean and Canadian readers. He is also the only son of the former Guyana and West Indies wicket-keeper batsman the late Clifford “Baby Boy” McWatt.
Guyana-born Reds (Perreira) has served as a world-recognized West Indies Cricket Commentator for well over fifty years. Reds made his broadcasting debut during the 1971 West Indies-India Test Series, and has commentated on hundreds of matches since then!
