ST JOHN’S, Antigua, CMC – Former West Indies captain Darren Sammy has praised the quality of the Windward Islands Volcanoes side and believes they can make strides in the ongoing Regional Super50.
Sammy said the squad included some extremely talented players, all of whom had the ability to make a positive impact in the tournament.
“I quite happy with the players in the team,” said Sammy who is playing in the premier Caribbean one-day tournament for the first time in several seasons.
“If you look on the bench, Kesrick Williams is yet to play a game and when he plays he is one of our best fast bowlers team, a wicket-taking bowler and I know he is eagerly waiting to get his chance.
“We have Leewards on Sunday and they too have won both their matches and we have to try and get a win against them.”
Volcanoes produced a strong all-round performance in their second game of the tournament on Friday night but still went down by two wickets to reigning champions, Trinidad and Tobago Red Force at Coolidge Cricket Ground.
They were slumping at 18 for three before Sunil Ambris slammed 69 and Sammy, an explosive unbeaten 60, to propel the score to 266 for seven.
Sammy was felled early in his innings on 10 by a short ball from West Indies speedster Shannon Gabriel but rebounded to smash four fours and five sixes in a 36-ball knock.
In the process, the 32-year-old surpassed 3 000 List A runs and now sits on 3036 runs.
“We lost some early wickets up front and I thought that Sunil Ambris and (Andre) Fletcher and then (Kavem) Hodge revived the innings,” Sammy explained.
“To come out in the end and add the finishing touch [was nice]. We should have got up to 280, I thought that would have been a winning score on that wicket but it was a lot left for the lower order to do. We did well to get to 260.”
Red Force got 80 from Jason Mohammed and 64 from opener Evin Lewis as they marched confidently toward their target. A middle order slump made the game close but Red Force held their nerve well in the end.
Sammy hailed Volcanoes’ fightback with the ball especially after Lewis and opening partner Kyle Hope (26) had posted 94 off 65 deliveries in a whirlwind start.
“I think we have a good squad. We lost a close one,” he said.
“Evin and [Hope] really took the game away from us in the first ten and we did really well to bring it back and get eight wickets and put them under pressure.”