Buoyed by a rare victory over arch rivals Trinidad and Tobago, the Barbados cricket team are looking forward to building on this success as they contest the quest for top honours in this year’s WICB Regional Four-Day Tournament.
Barbados recorded their first win over Trinidad and Tobago in a first-class match in five years and the five-wicket triumph following defeat by Jamaica is naturally having a positive effect on the psyche of the local players.
“It will obviously build confidence generally, but as a Barbados team, we still have to look at ourselves and see how we could have gone about doing our business a bit better,” coach Hendy Springer told NATIONSPORT shortly after Barbados completed victory in the post-lunch session on Sunday.
“As well as enjoying the points and enjoying the win that we had, I think that we can look at ourselves in the nets and see how we can do better against the opposition to come.”
Springer emphasized the focus being placed on supporting all individuals on the team, whether it be player, coach or manager.
Addressing the issue of the change in coaching personnel that attracted widespread discussion recently including a rumour that bowling coach Vasbert Drakes had been fired Springer said: “To my knowledge he has not been fired from the BCA.
“I was asked to coach the team again and to choose one of the coaches. In discussion with the captain, who I think is an integral part of the team set-up, we were going through a number of scenarios and in the final analysis I think we need to have at this point in time a batting coach.”
Springer said the batting had been struggling for a period of time and it was important to have someone deal with the batting drills and any aspect of batting.
“The bowling can handle itself. The bowling has developed to a stage where most of the guys who bowl for Barbados have bowled in Test matches as well,” the coach added.
Springer said it was good when the top five or six specialist batsmen could score heavily, as had been the case at certain points in our history.
“I don’t think it is about longer batting. I think it is about stronger batting,” he asserted when quizzed about the decision to play an extra seamer, Christopher Jordan, against the Trinidadians.
Springer was encouraged by the positive approach used by the batsmen against mystery spinner Sunil Narine, whom he describes as being deceptive.
The former Barbados off-spinner cited Narine’s ability to turn both ways and effectively use the straight delivery as key aspects of his armoury, though there were a number of other factors that contributed to his success.
“His action is not as smooth as the normal off-spinner as you would have seen back in the early days; Albert Padmore, Lawrence Maxwell, Tony Howard and those guys with a smooth flowing action,” Springer said.
“He has a more jerky type of action. The ball is difficult to pick up from the normal guy.”
