*Official* West Indies Tour of England 2020

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Windies players have all tested negative and leave Antigua soon

 

[JOJOXI]

A bit late on this but am a big fan of Kraigg Brathwaite but he hasn't performed for a good while now. I think the one thing in his favour is he's proven he can do it at Test level, an average of 33.29 certainly isn't terrible and you consider that goes up slightly if you ignore his early form - appreciate you could say that for everyone but when you make your debut as a teenager think he can be given some slack for finding his way - a big jump up from U19 and even domestic cricket to International cricket so difficult to have to make that transition so quickly.

That average goes up to just under 39 between the start of 2014 and the end of 2018 - and is only 3 runs lower then Dean Elgar a similarly scrappy accumulator of runs over the same time period. No doubt he has had an awful 2019 and a pretty poor 2018 too but when there are so few openers in the region - if you are looking domestically you've got 12 openers to choose from effectively, I'd personally give him more opportunities given you've got someone who has shown they can do it at Test level and to average just under 39 over a 5 year period as an opener of a largely struggling test team is no mean feat.

Also it was only 5 Tests ago Brathwaite and Campbell got the remaining runs to seal a 10wkt win against England, their 3 previous partnerships all being 50+ partnerships against England one of the stronger bowling outfits in seam-friendly conditions. Even the 1st innings of the St Lucia defeat 4 Tests ago brought a 50 opening stand. The pacers were key in that series win but having an opening pair that stopped West Indies being 40/3 until the series was already won was a vital step as well I think. Overall, the batting impressed me more in that series, I had no doubt of what Roach, Holder and Gabriel could do and thought seam-bowler friendly wickets were West Indies best/only chance of winning the series but I also doubted whether the batsman could get enough runs to be competitive. They managed to do so and I think in large part to that opening partnership.

 

[Starfighter]

Braithwaite's average has gone down that much huh? I can remember when it was 38 and I thought he might be the real deal. Barely seems to have reached double figures recently.

 

[Daemon]

Windies players have all tested negative and leave Antigua soon

Just wondering, didn't the mandatory 14 day quarantine for incoming travelers start on 8 June?

Why didn't the WIndies get there earlier so they could start training? Or do they have some sort of special permission?

 

[Beamer]

He has one of those techniques where if it goes wrong, it goes very wrong and he looks awful. I'd say 90% of his success is due to his incredible powers of concentration. Let's see how he does, he needs runs badly.

 

[Woodster]

Just wondering, didn't the mandatory 14 day quarantine for incoming travelers start on 8 June?

Why didn't the WIndies get there earlier so they could start training? Or do they have some sort of special permission?

May be completely wrong here but I was under the impression where they have been quarantined does have training facilities so they can get cracking as soon as they arrive.

 

[Woodster]

A bit late on this but am a big fan of Kraigg Brathwaite but he hasn't performed for a good while now. I think the one thing in his favour is he's proven he can do it at Test level, an average of 33.29 certainly isn't terrible and you consider that goes up slightly if you ignore his early form - appreciate you could say that for everyone but when you make your debut as a teenager think he can be given some slack for finding his way - a big jump up from U19 and even domestic cricket to International cricket so difficult to have to make that transition so quickly.

That average goes up to just under 39 between the start of 2014 and the end of 2018 - and is only 3 runs lower then Dean Elgar a similarly scrappy accumulator of runs over the same time period. No doubt he has had an awful 2019 and a pretty poor 2018 too but when there are so few openers in the region - if you are looking domestically you've got 12 openers to choose from effectively, I'd personally give him more opportunities given you've got someone who has shown they can do it at Test level and to average just under 39 over a 5 year period as an opener of a largely struggling test team is no mean feat.

Also it was only 5 Tests ago Brathwaite and Campbell got the remaining runs to seal a 10wkt win against England, their 3 previous partnerships all being 50+ partnerships against England one of the stronger bowling outfits in seam-friendly conditions. Even the 1st innings of the St Lucia defeat 4 Tests ago brought a 50 opening stand. The pacers were key in that series win but having an opening pair that stopped West Indies being 40/3 until the series was already won was a vital step as well I think. Overall, the batting impressed me more in that series, I had no doubt of what Roach, Holder and Gabriel could do and thought seam-bowler friendly wickets were West Indies best/only chance of winning the series but I also doubted whether the batsman could get enough runs to be competitive. They managed to do so and I think in large part to that opening partnership.

Liked the look of Brathwaite when he first came on the scene, more reserved style than you’d generally associate with the more flamboyant strokeplayers from the West Indies, but there is always room for a player of this nature to compliment the more flashy players (see Chanderpaul, Adams, etc). At 27 and with 59 Tests to his name he really needs to find a consistently good level of performance in order to push on, his last couple of years have been poor and that’s despite two centuries against Bangladesh. Be very interesting to see how he goes here this time.

 

[JOJOXI]

He has one of those techniques where if it goes wrong, it goes very wrong and he looks awful. I'd say 90% of his success is due to his incredible powers of concentration. Let's see how he does, he needs runs badly.

Agreed, and he does need runs but I think his concentration rightly or wrongly makes me a bigger fan of him - the idea of a player who might not look all that if you were to watch just 20 isolated minutes of his batting but has shown that he is able to graft his way to good scores. My biggest fear is if you let go of Brathwaite you let go of an opener who has shown they have what it takes at Test level and even during his poor 2 year spell I think he played a key role in the England series win - how often have West Indies had openers put up 4 50+ opening stands in 5 completed innings. He's had a series against India where only Brooks potentially came out of it in a better position batting wise, and a one-off Test against Afghanistann since. I don't want to completely gloss over the fact this has been an extended period of poor form but he does have a tough job opening especially with home pitches suiting the pacers in recent times. He does need to do better, how much better? I geninely think an average of low to mid 30s would be a qualified success especially if home pitches are produced with the home seamers in mind.

I also question who opens if you let go of Brathwaite, even over the last 2 years he averages 21 runs off 62 balls per innings. That isn't good enough but I don't think it needs a massive rise to be a workable average. If he could average 30 with his SR over 2 years that would be an average of 30 off 87 balls. In effect on average he is seeing out the opening session of a test match if batting first given the top order struggles I think that stickability is crucial. I'd keep both of Brathwaite in the side in the medium term but I'd argue there is a stronger case for getting rid of Shai Hope. Hope has less runs at a lower average and has done less for the Test side then Brathwaite - Hope really has only the twin hundreds (when Brathwaite almost achieved the same landmark of twin hundreds) and one really good 3rd innings knock v Pakistan as Test innings of note. He also has an easier job at 4 and is easier to replace post Covid19.

You could have Brooks 3, Bravo 4, Hetmyer 5, Chase 6 etc. or Brooks/Bravo 3, Hetmyer 4, Chase 5, Blackwood 6 etc. You could even throw Pooran in the middle order although I would really want to see Pooran play some FC matches first - no doubt he is talented but you could make the same argument for Shai Hope who has played FC cricket doing better then most in the region, excelled in ODI cricket but not been able to translate it to Test Cricket. Even if Pooran was to play West Indies A cricket in FC format rather then domestic cricket it would give him experience in the longer format and see if he is able to translate his ODI exploits into the Test format.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

When Kraigg was dominating school cricket in BD, I legit thought that he was gonna be one of the top 5 batsmen in the world if he plays test cricket. I believe he racked up over 100 centuries in all lower-level cricket before his test debut.
He bats and bat. I would have never thought that he would lose his knack for run making so easily as he has shown in the past 2-3 years. Even in this year's FC competition he was struggling. Only made the team because he was the skipper.

 

[GotSpin]

He always looked slightly limited but determined in defense I thought

 

[TestMatch]

The Kraigg thing is frustrating. For a while, he looked like he would blossom into the next Chanderpaul. His domestic numbers are great, and he has massive powers of concentration. But after that one great year he had, he's looked pretty poor. I don't know what's happened to him. He's been looking kind of depressed too.

Sad to see no Pooran on the team. He needs to be on the test team ASAP.

I feel Dowrich is underrated and one of the best bats on the team.

I can see Stokes and Root destroying this bowling attack.

 

[Flem274*]

west indies batting needs roadier domestic decks imo. it's counterintuitive in that you'd think tough decks would produce gritty batsmen, but batsmen seem to develop better when they get conditions they can learn to bat for ages in rather than lotteries. also helps the bowlers, forcing them to do more than put it down the other end.

 

[morgieb]

west indies batting needs roadier domestic decks imo. it's counterintuitive in that you'd think tough decks would produce gritty batsmen, but batsmen seem to develop better when they get conditions they can learn to bat for ages in rather than lotteries. also helps the bowlers, forcing them to do more than put it down the other end.

I've said this a few times but IMO you should be looking for your domestic decks to be flatter than your international ones.

I know domestic cricket has fewer days and you'd want results there but the point of domestic cricket is (generally) to produce great players for the national side. As you say flat decks mean that batsmen can learn how to build innings rather than live in fear of getting a good one, whereas bowlers actually learn the skills required to bowl effectively at Test level. Yes you may get a situation where you become home bullies, but that's still better than being meh everywhere. I also don't think it's a coincidence that Australia went to (relative) **** after they went away from producing great players for the national team rather than aiming for results.....

Internationals on the other hand have to be entertaining for the spectator, especially because of all those TESTS ARE DYING concern trolls in the media.

 

[GotSpin]

Agree with the both those posts

 

[JOJOXI]

The Kraigg thing is frustrating. For a while, he looked like he would blossom into the next Chanderpaul. His domestic numbers are great, and he has massive powers of concentration. But after that one great year he had, he's looked pretty poor. I don't know what's happened to him. He's been looking kind of depressed too.

Sad to see no Pooran on the team. He needs to be on the test team ASAP.

I feel Dowrich is underrated and one of the best bats on the team.

I can see Stokes and Root destroying this bowling attack.

Presuming you mean 2014 where he averaged just under 78. But I think 2016 (55.72 average) and even 2017 (37.15) are decent numbers - for all the craze Dean Elgar gets he averages less then 40 in his Test match career. But does need to improve on his last two years.

Glad you mentioned Dowrich I agree often think he's underappreciated - even in recent times I've seen massive criticism of his selections and think he often gets unfair blame when it comes to complaints about Barbados players dominating the West Indies Test squad. Dowrich averages 40 since the start of 2018 - given he often comes in at 7 he's probably the only player in the side who outperforms most of his counterparts in a batting slot. I can't imagine many other number 7s average 40 over a two year spell yet if you ask people who West Indies best Test batsman is I don't think Dowrich would get into the conversation really but credit to the guy I didn't know his average in recent times was quite as good as it was but always appreciated that he gets quiet, efficient runs.

 

[Shady Slim]

i think that JOJOXI's bang on with regard to kraigg here that even an average of 30 striking at the rate he does would be awesome for that team, and just to get to 35ish striking at what he does would see him eat up a hundred balls on average which for that team is huge tbh. the windies are a young team on the rise but have a lot of boom-bust guys in the middle order (though there's more grit in that team than most think), the guys such as blackwood and hetmeyer et al who are very flamboyant but still very raw (though blackwood has test experience). the point i'm getting at is that can be on bad days quite a collapse prone sort of middle order; a guy that eats up 90-100 balls at the start of the innings and gets the team off to a start means those guys can come in and play their natural game with more freedom and really lets them thrive and be themselves, and helps to put a stopper on the collapses that were plaguing the windies during the darker era in the earlier part of the decade.

one of the huge reasons why the windies have been slowly getting more and more competitive (as shown by their most recent couple of series against the poms), aside from the bowling, has a lot to do with how their batting has really starched up in the long form and been able to grind teams away and a kraigg at the top in form can go a long way to achieving that

 

[marc71178]

Presuming you mean 2014 where he averaged just under 78. But I think 2016 (55.72 average) and even 2017 (37.15) are decent numbers - for all the craze Dean Elgar gets he averages less then 40 in his Test match career. But does need to improve on his last two years.

Glad you mentioned Dowrich I agree often think he's underappreciated - even in recent times I've seen massive criticism of his selections and think he often gets unfair blame when it comes to complaints about Barbados players dominating the West Indies Test squad. Dowrich averages 40 since the start of 2018 - given he often comes in at 7 he's probably the only player in the side who outperforms most of his counterparts in a batting slot. I can't imagine many other number 7s average 40 over a two year spell yet if you ask people who West Indies best Test batsman is I don't think Dowrich would get into the conversation really but credit to the guy I didn't know his average in recent times was quite as good as it was but always appreciated that he gets quiet, efficient runs.

Interesting point about Dowrich but the majority of the reason for the average of 40 is his batting at 6 significantly bringing things up. At 7 he averages 32, and the one innings of substance in that time (which brings that average up from the low 20s) came under a distinct lack of pressure bearing in mind the match situation when he came in.

Amongst people with a reasonable number of innings at 7, he’s behind de Kock, Pant, Sarfraz Ahmed and Paine and not much ahead of de Grandhomme, Pandya, Buttler and Dickwella which probably gives an indication as to why people wouldn’t immediately think of him when discussing the team’s top batsmen?

 

[Flem274*]

isn't sarfraz dropped? you're severely overrating pant and paine as well

 

[marc71178]

isn't sarfraz dropped? you're severely overrating pant and paine as well

I’m solely talking of averages at 7 in that time frame.

 

[Magrat Garlick]

Interesting point about Dowrich but the majority of the reason for the average of 40 is his batting at 6 significantly bringing things up. At 7 he averages 32, and the one innings of substance in that time (which brings that average up from the low 20s) came under a distinct lack of pressure bearing in mind the match situation when he came in.

Amongst people with a reasonable number of innings at 7, he’s behind de Kock, Pant, Sarfraz Ahmed and Paine and not much ahead of de Grandhomme, Pandya, Buttler and Dickwella which probably gives an indication as to why people wouldn’t immediately think of him when discussing the team’s top batsmen?

runs being worth more at seven than at six is a weird one