***Official*** Zimbabwe in West Indies, 2013

[WindieWeathers]

I can't see how Zimbabwe can trouble the Windies in a proper test either.

Yeah we're on a roll in the tests, beat NZ 2-0 and then beat Bang 2-0 , plus we drew our last test vs England before those series so we're five tests unbeaten, obviously not the greatest opposition but it's giving us belief before the real test which is in July against Pak at home.

Could be some interesting test selections, will Sammy play or will they go with two spinners? will Pollard make his test debut like Colin Croft seems to be suggesting? who knows. Shannon Gabriel also impressed on his test debut against England before he was injured so he might get another chance.

Another concern is Gayle, he's been on shocking form for the last two series so Adrian Barath might be in line for a recall.

Zimbabwe will be playing a four day warm up match this week against our academy, the team will most likely be..

Charles
Griffith
Fletcher
Lesporis
Hope
Blackwood
Hamilton (wk)
Cariah
Cummins
Cotterrell
Warrican

It's a tidy little unit who has some dangerous quicks in Cummins and Cotterrell while Cariah and Warrican will take care of the spin, in the top six we all know Charles but there's big hopes for Lesporis and especially the jamaican Jermain Blackwood, Hamilton is a keeper with decent potential too and just got his first FC ton for Leewards.

 

[Chook Herron]

I just hope Zimbabwe can make a game of the tests. I don't expect a win or a draw but a fight would be nice. Cremer hasn't really been bowling that well in the domestic comps lately, but he can't do much worse than Utseya and Mushangwe. Price is more likely to be picked in front of Cremer I think. I hope Meth gets to make his test debut

 

[Prince EWS]

Cremer and Price should both be playing.

 

[Daemon]

What happened to that pace bowler Cribb was drooling over when they played NZ?

 

[Prince EWS]

What happened to that pace bowler Cribb was drooling over when they played NZ?

Jarvis? Still around. Not very good at one day cricket yet but he should be a bigger threat in the Tests if he bowls properly.

Unless you mean Meth, who still hasn't played a Test. Meth

You probably do; I'd definitely drool over Meth more than Jarvis. Not sure I'd call him a "pace" bowler though; he's a slower Praveen basically.

 

[Daemon]

Jarvis? Still around. Not very good at one day cricket yet but he should be a bigger threat in the Tests if he bowls properly.

Unless you mean Meth, who still hasn't played a Test. Meth

You probably do; I'd definitely drool over Meth more than Jarvis. Not sure I'd call him a "pace" bowler though; he's a slower Praveen basically.

Nah, Brian Vitori.

Might be wrong about you 'drooling' over him but I definitely remember you saying you thought he was the real deal. Haven't seen around lately so I was wondering what happened.

 

[Prince EWS]

Nah, Brian Vitori.

Might be wrong about you 'drooling' over him but I definitely remember you saying you thought he was the real deal. Haven't seen around lately so I was wondering what happened.

I've always been more sceptical of him than most followers on Zimbabwe cricket actually, especially by the time the New Zealand tour rolled around. I remember telling Chubb to cool his jets.

He's been plagued by injury and the inability to bowl to right handed batsmen since. Realistically he has more tools than anyone else in the country to be a threatening Test standard bowler but unless they're refined more he's not going to sit amongst the top six or seven bowlers in the country.

 

[Prince EWS]

My two posts containing the word Vitori in the NZ/Zim thread.

Depends on his fitness, rhythm and what session it is.

I've seen him bowl spells where he was consistently pushing 140; I've also seen him bowl spells where he failed to break the 120 barrier.

This has been seriously disappointing from Zimbabwe. All the talk of how green the wicket was obviously got to Taylor's head because even though Zimbabwe haven't bowled very well, the wicket is pretty much straw coloured and looks like a typical Napier road; it would've been great to rack up an imposing score batting first instead of doing this.

Jarvis has been pretty good, IMO - he's basically performed as a support bowler who's leading the attack which never works particular well but he's beaten the bat often enough and looked genuinely threatening. All the talk about how much Shingi has improved and how he's now he's now a 140-145km/hr bowler looks like it was pretty much rubbish, although he does at least seem a little more accurate now which is a plus. Given he replaced Mpofu, bowling 128km/hr straight balls that bounce a little at sub-par but not disgraceful levels of accuracy means he probably did a fair job of filling in, actually. Vitori has been absolutely rubbish, carrying on the trend from every other time he's bowled since that Bangladesh series was over; if Meth was fit or Querl/Rainsford were on tour I'd axe him in a blink. Cremer has been a little disappointing as well, he was always going to go at 4.5rpo or so IMO but I expected him to cause a little more trouble in between pies. He's only really bowled on Day 1 so far though, to be fair. Hamilton Masakadza has arguably been Zimbabwe's best bowler which says it all really; the bloke should be lucky to bowl 5 overs in a day's play and he's been a frontline bowler for the side. There's seriously more to Brownlie's bowling, although Hamilton as always has bowled a reasonable line at least, which is more than you can say for his brother or Vitori.

 

[Prince EWS]

Yeah it wasn't a fun tour...

 

[Daemon]

Possibly the Bangladesh series then

 

[Prince EWS]

Possibly the Bangladesh series then

Yeah he absolutely cleaned up in the Bangladesh series; Tests and one dayers. He was at full fitness, had no niggles and their top order was full of left handers. Was swinging it away from the LHB at heat.

 

[WindieWeathers]

Yeah that Vitori bloke really did have a decent spell a few years ago, the zim commentator during the t20 game said he wish Vitori was picked for the tests even though he hasn't been bowling that well of late, then we have Chigimbora (sp)? who apparently done well in the bangledash t20s but still wasn't picked for this tour.

The fact is though we're a confident side at the moment, so they've caught us at the wrong time, especially at home, Weller and Ervin have been a pain in the backside during this whole limited overs games though, while Sibanda and Masakadsa look like they've gonna get a good knock coming around the corner, so i'm sure we'll be pushed at various stages during this test series.

But like i said we've got some question marks over our line-up, some more are will Samuels play? he hasn't played a game since he was injured at the big bash, Jamaica are playing a four day game starting on Wednesday and he hasn't been picked for it, so i'm having my doubts that he'll make it, Sarwan might replace him methinks, and there's question marks over Rampaul, he played for Trinidad yesterday but some are suggesting he doesn't look anywhere near fit yet, if he can't play i hope they don't turn to the status quo i.e Best and give a youngster a go, picking Gabriel or Holder would be good to see.

 

[Chubb]

Yes, I did talk up Vitori. Had him as an avatar for a while, christened him "The Masvingo Meteor". Everything went to pieces soon after that.

 

[benchmark00]

Great to see one of the lesser nations playing test cricket. They're probably in with half a shot against Zimbabwe too.

 

[WindieWeathers]

Great to see one of the lesser nations playing test cricket. They're probably in with half a shot against Zimbabwe too.

Yeah, little WI are gonna really struggle in this series for sure!!! .

 

[Stapel]

Yeah we're on a roll in the tests, beat NZ 2-0 and then beat Bang 2-0 , plus we drew our last test vs England before those series so we're five tests unbeaten, obviously not the greatest opposition but it's giving us belief before the real test which is in July against Pak at home.

Could be some interesting test selections, will Sammy play or will they go with two spinners? will Pollard make his test debut like Colin Croft seems to be suggesting? who knows. Shannon Gabriel also impressed on his test debut against England before he was injured so he might get another chance.

Another concern is Gayle, he's been on shocking form for the last two series so Adrian Barath might be in line for a recall.

Zimbabwe will be playing a four day warm up match this week against our academy, the team will most likely be..

Charles
Griffith
Fletcher
Lesporis
Hope
Blackwood
Hamilton (wk)
Cariah
Cummins
Cotterrell
Warrican

It's a tidy little unit who has some dangerous quicks in Cummins and Cotterrell while Cariah and Warrican will take care of the spin, in the top six we all know Charles but there's big hopes for Lesporis and especially the jamaican Jermain Blackwood, Hamilton is a keeper with decent potential too and just got his first FC ton for Leewards.

I really cannot see Sammy dropped. Won't happen! Neither will Gayle be dropped.

 

[Chook Herron]

Vitori is out injured, but he's form has been poor in the Logan Cup this year anyway. Had he been fit, he probably would have been picked for the tour still.

 

[Chook Herron]

I've spoken to a few English county cricket fans on another forum about Querl. From those that have seen him bowl in the flesh for the Unicorns, when he's tries to bowl quicker is when his actions looks suspicous. It seems he has to bowl within self in order to keep his action tight.

Recently in the Logan Cup one of the other teams refused to come out of the dressing rooms after being forced to follow-on by the Tuskers because they believed Querl was chucking even though the umpires hadn't called him. Heath Streak, his coach was questioned about his action and he sought of brushed it off and stated the reason why he wasn't picked for the tour was because he "needed to get his papers sorted" which is Zimbabwean for we don't want to pick him but we won't say why.

From what I gather if he gets picked, get's called for chucking in an ICC game then ZCB have to pay to get his action tested which they don't want to do. If he still doesn't get picked in the next home series when "he's papers" are not an excuse then this is the best bet.

This is an article in relation to this incident and the fact that Querl had been called for chucking the week before. Certainly doesn't look good for him. It's a little concerning that his coach Heath Streak appears to have done nothing to assist him in changing his action and has just allowed Querl to continue to bowl with his action.

Midwest Rhinos players protest against Querl bowling action

 

[WindieWeathers]

The squad for the first test has been picked!!

Gayle
Powell
Darren Bravo
Samuels
Chanderpaul
Ramdin (wk)
Sammy (c)
Permaul
Shillingford
Gabriel
Best
Roach
Deonarine

Link

I'm utterly disgusted by this so called "squad" , all they've done is retained the status quo and somehow contrived to drop our best spinner!!.. it's bloody madness, Narine yesterday took 6 wickets in around ten minuets against Guyana, a team including Sarwan, Chanderpaul, Deonarine etc, Shilly's been good this season, and his 10fer against Australia was well earned, but Narine is on a different planet to him, Sunil didn't do himself justice in Bang, but how is a spinner meant to develop at test level after just four and a half tests? it doesn't make sense.

Then we have the Sammy situation!!..it really doesn't matter what the prat does he's kept in the side, he's been garbage in our last three test series but yet they keep him and have the cheek to drop Narine!!..it's incredible,

Another who is somehow in the squad is Gayle, he's been an embarrassment over the last four months but i guess they are counting on him bullying Zimbabwe and getting into form, i wouldn't bet on it though, against Winwards in the past two days he made 15 and 0, he's a shadow of his former self,

All in all i'm not excited about this series, yes we'll most likely win it but i wanted to see some other names get a chance, not the same old faces who aren't the future of WI cricket.

 

[theegyptian]

This is an article in relation to this incident and the fact that Querl had been called for chucking the week before. Certainly doesn't look good for him. It's a little concerning that his coach Heath Streak appears to have done nothing to assist him in changing his action and has just allowed Querl to continue to bowl with his action.

Midwest Rhinos players protest against Querl bowling action

Interesting stuff. I thought Querl was just waiting/hoping on a English county contract which presumably pays and is more secure than playing international for Zim but seems there is a bit more to the situation. Not an easy situation for anyone involved.