Kieron Pollard, the West Indies captain, stated that the older players in the team cannot be blamed for the team’s poor performance in the T20 World Cup. The team’s poor performance, he claimed, had a bad impact on the players in the locker room.
The defending champions had the most T20 experience of any team entering the competition. The West Indies, however, did not benefit from it, as they were eliminated from the tournament after losing three of their first four Super 12 matches.
Kieron Pollard said after the match against Sri Lanka on Thursday that the older players did not provide enough support to the younger guys.
“A couple of young guys are putting up their hands (up) but the experienced guys, myself included, have not done well. We are not going to hide from the fact that it’s been disappointing for us. I’m sure all the guys are hurting in that dressing room. It’s something we didn’t see it coming but we have to face reality,” Kieron Pollard said.
Over the course of the four games, none of the team’s more experienced players were able to stand out. With the bat, Kieron Pollard (46 runs), Chris Gayle (30 runs), Lendl Simmons (19 runs), and Andre Russell (7 runs) struggled. Dwayne Bravo, a bowling all-rounder, only managed two wickets in four games.
Kieron Pollard
During the tournament, Kieron Pollard admitted that his teammates’ cricketing intelligence was lacking. He revealed that certain roles were assigned to individual individuals, but that they were not fully realized.
“I think cricket smarts is something that has plagued us. We have spoken time and time again, especially from a batting perspective what we need to do as individuals and we have not done well.” he said
“I think we were below par. In a crucial match like this, you don’t want to see those things (for fielding). Our bowlers did okay, they got 189 but it was a very good batting track.” he added
West Indies were given a difficult target of 190 runs after winning the toss and putting Sri Lanka in to bat. They only managed 169/8 in reply, thanks to Shimron Hetmyer’s half-century and Nicholas Pooran’s 46.
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