Windies seek legends' help after Australia debacle
Shallow insisted the team is in "a rebuilding phase" and investment is being made to reignite the "spirit that has long made West Indies cricket a force in the world".He added: "Progress is rarely straightforward. It takes time, perseverance and belief, especially in our most difficult moments."There is much work to be done. But we must do it with purpose, and we must do it together."
'An accident waiting to happen'
West Indies have been battling with "systemic issues" for 25 years that have left them with players "ill-equipped" to deal with the challenges they faced against Australia, according to Trinidadian commentator Fazeer Mohammed."It was almost the perfect storm," he told BBC Sport."You've got Mitchell Starc, a world class bowler, deadly in any sort of situation and even deadlier with the pink ball, coming up against players really ill-equipped to deal with those sorts of challenges."Everything was set up for something like this to happen. You never really factor in 27 all out but, in the general context of West Indies cricket, this was an accident waiting to happen."While Lara has been drafted in to help find a solution to the problems facing the current side, Mohammed believes the iconic left-hander's heroics were part of the reason a lot of the issues were masked for so long."What lies behind it is the failure to address the fundamental challenges in our domestic game - in our regional game," he added."We have many different challenges. Fundamental to those would be costs because we have many different territories - it's very costly to travel around the Caribbean, to host tournaments."There's an air of resignation about it. People will this morning be arguing amongst themselves and debating about how this can happen, who needs to be fired, who needs to be dropped, who needs to be got rid of."It's the same sort of knee-jerk reaction and then they'll shrug their shoulders and say 'well this is how it is now'."It is almost two and a half years since West Indies last won a Test series - 1-0 in Zimbabwe - and three years since their last home series victory, 2-0 against Bangladesh."I don't think all is lost by any stretch of the imagination," Mohammed said."It requires at a very fundamental level at the schools, at the under-19, under-23 levels a serious financial investment in growing the quality of the game - male and female."But also there has to be, first and foremost, that recognition that Test cricket still means something to us in the Caribbean."
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Times
43 minutes ago
- Times
Choosing Liam Dawson over Rehan Ahmed cost England against India, says coach
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'I don't think we'll be seeing him a lot in the near future. I spoke to Marcus Trescothick [England batting coach] about Rehan earlier in the season because I wanted the England management to have a look at him as a top- order bat, and as a batter who can certainly offer them an option with his bowling,' Thomas added. 'I think they wanted to see how he went over the season, but now I don't think my No 3 batter could have done anything more so far this season than to perform as he has with both bat and ball.' Ahmed, given 42 overs on a docile surface as Kent replied with 445 for eight, finished with three for 134, but Leicestershire's attack was blunted chiefly by Ben Compton's 8½-hour 221, a career-best score for the 31-year-old opener. Leicestershire are now 52 points clear of third-placed Derbyshire, who were outplayed by Northamptonshire but held on for a draw thanks to an unbroken sixth-wicket stand of 131 between Luis Reece and Brooke Guest after rain allowed only 38 final-day overs at Wantage Road. Second-placed Glamorgan, meanwhile, look heavy favourites to go up with Leicestershire, with three matches to go, after completing an impressive 154-run victory over Lancashire at Old Trafford that moved them to within 28 points of the second-tier leaders. Mason Crane took his wicket haul to nine in the match as Lancashire were bowled out for 318 in their second innings, while at Cheltenham there was a maiden hundred for 21-year-old Joe Phillips, who scored 136 in his eighth first-class match, as Gloucestershire played out a high-scoring draw with Middlesex in a rain-ravaged match. 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Daily Mail
43 minutes ago
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England might be favourites had they taken their chances on a chaotic day of 15 wickets but India remain pumped-up and desperate to salvage a series draw, writes LAWRENCE BOOTH
Only two days into this fifth and final Test, England are facing a gloves-off battle against a pumped-up Indian team desperate for what they regard as the just deserts of a series draw. At lunch on the fourth day in Manchester, England had seemed poised for a 3–1 lead and their best triumph since the arrival of Brendon McCullum. By Friday-night stumps at The Oval, following another day of fast cricket and flaring tempers, the possibility was growing of 2–2, after Yashasvi Jaiswal – dropped on 20 and 40 – gave India 's second innings a turbocharged start. The tourists will resume on Saturday morning on 75 for two, of which Jaiswal has 51 from just 49 balls. They lead by a slender 52, but know that their opponents are a man down because of Chris Woakes's shoulder injury, and that the weather is set fair for what should be the best batting conditions of the match. Had England taken their opportunities on a chaotic day of 15 wickets, they might now be favourites. 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The Guardian
43 minutes ago
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Gus Atkinson punches ticket to Ashes as obvious key peg in England's attack
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Early on Duckett took 24 off nine balls, including an outstanding example of the Hedgehog Sweep, bunching his quills into a ball, rolling over, whirling his bat past his left shoulder. Crawley kept battering the ball through the offside with such noble and soldierly command you half expected to look down and notice he was batting in epaulettes and a plumed hat. It felt like a Baz-manifesto statement at exactly the right moment, timed to disrupt lengths on a line and length pitch. And for a Stokes-free England a sense, as the ball fizzed to all corners, of Stokes being utterly present, a giant head in the sky above the red brick pavilion, beard massive, eyes blazing. The second and more vital of the two vital things came immediately before this, as Gus Atkinson did an important thing without really seeming to do an important thing. He did so brusquely and methodically as ever, marking a pencil point, inserting a rawlplug of appropriate gauge and putting a first firm screw in the wall, the obvious key peg in England's attack come November in Perth. Atkinson was his usual bashful self as he raised the ball to the stands on his home ground after completing five for 33 to close India's innings. He has that studied anonymity, the look of the forgotten sixth member of a boyband, now grudgingly back for the reunion tour. But he made a decisive statement here, and at a key moment. It is easy to lose sight of the fact England don't really have a hypothetical first choice bowling attack right now. Who have we got then? What's the check-board? Archer: yes, hopefully fit. Wood: yes, who knows. Woakes: crocked. Tongue: fit, raw. Carse: fit, decent. Cook: don't think so. Potts: hmm. Overton: no. And outside of this, who knows? Another Overton? Sonny Baker? Eddie Jack? Jack Eddie? Promising Yorkshire quick Dougal Cakebread? At the end of day two at the Oval England do now have the only actual double tick. Atkinson: yes, fit and ready. And to be fair it probably was always Atkinson and four others. But was it really? Why was he playing club cricket? Why is he suddenly in Surrey Twos? What are the whispers about endurance, fatigue, dipping pace? Is Atkinson actually good? Is this thing for real? The five-for here was confirmation, first of that stellar early record, and second, just in the eye test. Atkinson looked so much better than everyone else here, all clean lines, simple, easy action, the whip in his delivery, the flick of the wrist. His pace was up at 88mph at times. Sign up to The Spin Subscribe to our cricket newsletter for our writers' thoughts on the biggest stories and a review of the week's action after newsletter promotion Of his wickets Dhruv Jurel was a good, Aussie-facing one, a hard edge from bounce not lateral movement that flew thrillingly high to Harry Brook. And yes, Australia isn't really a thing you can masterplan, despite the fact England always try. Well, we need tall, very quick, hit-the-deck bowlers who can go all day. Good luck with that. We remember Boyd Rankin flailing about like a wounded wampa in Sydney in 2010. He was tall. Atkinson is more from the 2010 metronomic plus decent pace template. Although the real key to that series was that Australia weren't very good. For the second day in a row Atkinson found a lovely rhythm early on. He had Washington Sundar caught hooking at an 87mph bouncer. He padded the numbers with two in an over at the end, bowled and nicked off, having promised to go straighter. But it was well deserved having provided the only element of control on day one. He looked like a leader too. It is easy to forget how good his start has been, and how hard this is to do after just 21 non-Test first class games to date. His method looks transferable. He has skills, can bowl a yorker, can, crucially, seam the ball away from the right hander, a function perhaps of how high his arm is at point of delivery. Atkinson may lack the star power and extreme early-spell speed of Jofra Archer. But he also has the Test record Archer was meant to have by now. Late in the day India kicked off their second innings 23 runs in arrears. It was Josh Tongue who made the breakthrough from the Vauxhall End. By then Atkinson had already laid down his own marker.
