West Indies on cloud nine

by Rex Clementine

All of us Sri Lankans have grown up admiring West Indies. Kumar Sangakkara once said that as a kid when West Indies played Sri Lanka, he wasn’t sure which side to support. And he wasn’t alone. It has been painful to see their decline over the last two decades. No Champions Trophy, No World Cup, no five-match series against the big boys, the West Indies were going down the drain. The impact that the likes of Roberts, Holding, Marshall, Richards and Lara made are only a distant memory.

When West Indies landed in Australia this month, there was talk of whether they were worthy to compete against Pat Cummins’ side. That scathing criticism is justifiable for West Indies have been a pale shadow of their former selves.

Young, inexperienced and written off, West Indies had their moments in Adelaide in the first Test but were beaten by ten wickets as their batters didn’t back up the quicks.

But at the Gabba, they were awesome. The tail had done well to stitch some valuable partnerships in the day-night Test and the quicks were on the money again.

Alzarri Joseph and Kemar Roach had their moments in the first innings to restrict Australia to 289 and then in the second essay, the young Shemar Joseph was all over the Aussies finishing with seven wickets.

A toe-crushing yorker from Mitchell Starc on day three had ended Joseph’s innings prematurely and he wasn’t even going to come to the Gabba on day four as Australia needed 156 with eight wickets in hand.

But the 24-year-old from Guyana, who had featured in just five first class games before coming to Australia turned up at the ground, got some pain killer injections and made the Aussies eat humble pie bowling quick and straight.

Not many teams other than India and South Africa have won in Australia in the last two decades. They are such a tough team to beat anywhere, but it goes onto show what a couple of bowlers speeding at 140kmph can do.

Most Sri Lankans fans feel that West Indies cricket is back on track. That seems to be the feeling with rest of the cricket world too. But hey, don’t get carried away. We felt the same earlier too. It only takes 30 pieces of silver from Mr. Srinivasan or Mr. Ambani to bring it all back to square one.

from The Island https://ift.tt/XgdK3Oe