Williams: Windies will be ready for ODI series
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados (CMC) — West Indies head coach David Williams is confident his charges will be fully ready for the one-day series against Australia next year, despite having to use the upcoming four-day season as preparation.
West Indies will return Down Under to play five One-Day Internationals and two Twenty20 Internationals from February 4-23 next year and Williams noted that while the squad would not have a diet of the game’s shortened forms as preparation, he believed the regional first class season would keep them in form.
“We have the Christmas Holidays and after that you have the start of the domestic season. The four-day cricket is not the ideal thing in preparation for the one-day cricket, but it’s cricket and once the guys are playing cricket they should be in nick come the one-days,” said Williams, who oversaw the recent three-Test tour the Windies lost 2-0.
“So it’s all about analyzing yourself where you went wrong in the last series, putting your little stuff in place and and getting yourself mentally ready for that series.
“We have a fair idea how the wickets play in Australia and the guys have learnt a lot especially the young guys and I’m sure it will be a lot easier for them to prepare themselves mentally.”
West Indies returned from a tough tour of Australia on Tuesday, where they failed to break their 12-year streak of having not won a Test Down Under.
They lost the opening Test in Brisbane by an innings and 65 runs and while they drew the second match in Adelaide, they went down in the final encounter at Perth by 35 runs.
West Indies will leave next month for the one-day series but Williams said he did not believe there would be a camp in the intervening period, especially with the four-day season in progress.
“I don’t see that (camp) happening for this Australian tour simply because there’s domestic cricket going on and there will be two games before we fly out again so once the guys are playing cricket we will be happy with that,” the Trinidadian explained.
“We will ensure that everybody gets a chance to play at domestic level so we can pick from a wider range.”