West Indies legend, Sir Andy Roberts, is of the opinion that the mixing of the batting order is contributing to the poor showing of West Indies in the ongoing T20 World Cup.
The title holders have lost both their matches convincingly so far, after being bowled out for 55 against England and restricted to 143 for eight versus South Africa.
Roberts, who appeared on the Mason and Guest radio programme on Tuesday stated, “I believe the changing of the batting order causes problems because of all the batsmen, [Shimron] Hetymer looks the best in the warm up games and impressed me and you move him who batted at three sometimes and [Nicholas] Pooran who is batting at four or five or six, bring him up to three.”
The 70-year-old former pacer argued that Chris Gayle should not be included in the side if he has to bat anywhere lower than the top three positions.
“I think if Chris is going to bat below number three, then he has no right to be in the team… what he is going to do when you need to rotate the strike more as the overs keep going? Chris’ strong point is at the top of the order where he can set the pace by playing his natural game which is hitting straight,” he said.
Roberts, who formed part of the dominant West Indies side from 1974 to 1983 explained that the side is also soaking up too many dot balls and despite the big hitting capabilities, strike rotation is still necessary.
In the opening match against England, of the 86 balls bowled in their innings, 59 were dots, representing 68 per cent of the innings while against South Africa where the defending champions batted the entire innings, 56 balls were not scored off of, depicting 46 per cent of the innings.
