West Indies will continue their road to the 2027 ODI World Cup with a three-match ODI series, with the first ODI at Thiruvananthapuram on Sunday.
Ahead of the away India ODI series, West Indian head coach Daren Sammy said that the series will serve as a big chance to challenge themselves and measure up where they are in the format, noting that beating the Men in Blue is important if a team wants to win a major ICC trophy.
West Indian head coach Daren Sammy said that the series will serve as a big chance to challenge themselves and measure up where they are in the format, noting that beating the Men in Blue is important if a team wants to win a major ICC trophy.
“So it is a great opportunity for us as a team to come out here and challenge ourselves and measure ourselves as to where we are in ODIs. “And we are playing them here at home in their conditions, and performing well and winning gives us a fair idea as to what we could do as a team and how capable we are in competing on the world stage. “However, if we have to look back as to where we were and what we have been able to achieve as an ODI team, we’ve made some strides. “Vitel, to me, he is a find for us. What we saw in him that caused him to debut against New Zealand was all part of the planning and the processes we put in place. You have heard me for years talking about a wrist spinner in the West Indies team. And Vitel, he came in and he immediately had an impact on the bowling unit for us.
Heading into the qualifiers in February, you know, that is our number one focus – continuing to fine-tune the team so that when we go to the qualifiers, we put ourselves in a position to book our ticket to South Africa,” added the two-time T20 World Cup champion. Sammy views this series as a vital part of the team’s WC preparation, saying, as quoted by Cricinfo, that it is a great chance for them to win their first ODI series in India after 24 years. And I think it is a great opportunity for us, the players that we have, to come and put in a good show against India and look to win a series, something we’ve not done in 24 years. Missing automatic qualification by six points, starting from where we were back then, which was, I think, 19 or 20 points behind, and accumulating those points, I thought we made a lot of strides in making a claim to automatic qualification.
“It is 24 years since we have won a series here in India,” Sammy said ahead of the first ODI, as quoted by Cricinfo. “If you have to win a major ICC event, especially in the white-ball format, you have to beat India,” he said. Sammy feels encouraged by his team’s progress, saying that while they have not made it to the World Cup, they have “made some strides” in ODI set-up, with several batters like Shai Hope, Amir Jangoo, Sherfane Rutherford stepping up with the bat and veteran pacer Alzarri Joseph also doing well. “The reality of the situation [is] we’ve not made it,” Sammy said.
