CHENNAI, India. CMC– West Indies start their campaign against Pakistan in the ICC Women T20 World Cup today, hard pressed to dispense with the flaws that triggered a spate of recent defeats in the shorter format.
Exploiting opportunities, sustaining pressure periods and closing off innings with greater efficiency are areas the side has been working to improve after losing matches against South Africa, India and Australia.
“Certainly there were some opportunities that could have gone either way and we should have taken those chances,” said head coach Vasbert Drakes.
“Certainly from a batting perspective if we would have closed off the innings a lot better, rather than lose wickets in clusters I think we would have had the control that would have allowed us to win the games”.
The Caribbean side defeated South Africa Women 2-1 in the One-Day International series but then lost the T20 series by an identical margin.
They later lost to India by 45 runs in a warm-up and on Monday crashed to a 43-run loss to Australia in their official warm-up game.
“I don’t think that we have been a bad side in the last couple of weeks it’s just that we played some cricket where we didn’t create enough pressure for long periods,” said Drakes.West Indies have been installed in Group B along with Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and England.
The West Indies players, who defeated Pakistan in One Day Internationals and T20 Internationals in the Caribbean last year, are eyeing India as the team to beat in this tournament.
“Certainly playing India in India, they will be quite familiar with the conditions. They will be a force to reckon with they have been playing some good cricket over the last couple of months,” the head coach pointed out.
“We played Pakistan in the Caribbean and we did well against them and certainly Bangladesh is a side you can’t take for granted and England have been playing some good cricket in the last couple warm-up games.”
On Monday, the Caribbean side collapsed to 96 all out off 19 overs without a single player passing 20 while chasing 140 for victory against the Aussies.
The total was their third low score in four T20 contests in recent weeks but despite the poor totals Drakes says the players remain upbeat.
“We are feeling good about ourselves to go out there and play the cricket that everyone knows that we are capable of playing,” he said.
“It is just a matter of the girls going out there and feeling good about their game. They know that our preparation was really solid.”
The match begins 10AM Eastern Caribbean time/9AM Jamaica time.
