… credits Kohli for advice on approach to batting

By Clifton Ross

LEADING West Indies Test batsman Jermaine Blackwood is giving full confidence to his players ahead of the series which bowls off in a few days, adding that some advice from Virat Kohli has further helped him tremendously as a player.
The Jamaican, who topped West Indies Test run charts during the plagued 2020, spoke virtually following yesterday’s session, where he outlined that one key aspect of the Test encounter is the pitch conditions, which proved to be the Windies undoing in the One Day International (ODI) series.
“These types of surfaces are very slow so I have to be prepared mentally, because technically I can’t do too much work right now. But mentally I know it is going to be very slow and it will spin. Once mentally I am ready, I am good. Then everything takes care of itself,” said the batsman.
A top performer in the Test series against England, New Zealand and now with sights set on Bangladesh, he has been the most consistent batter with regard to his scoring and conversion of fifties to hundreds.

Outside of natural talent, Blackwood credited some talks with India skipper Kohli who gave him some nifty advice on improving his game as a batsman and player overall, a huge plus heading into such a series the Caribbean side absolutely need to win.
“I don’t really have a lot of conversations with international players. I talked to Virat Kohli a few times as well, on social media. The last time India toured the Caribbean, I had a chance to talk to him in Jamaica when I was there subbing. So after the game, I just had a small conversation.”
He continued, “I asked him about how all the time that I have a lot of half-centuries and one century. He just said, what will you do when you score a century. How many deliveries did you face, I said I faced 212 balls. He said that’s it. Once you can bat some balls, you’re gonna score runs,” Blackwood explained.

Losing the ODI series 3-nil has put the tourists under some pressure, especially after their young side failed. More so, Blackwood said he doesn’t plan to alter his approach; highlighting the intense training the team have been conducting ahead of the Test series. “I am not really going to change my role. For the last two series, I have been scoring runs. My goal is to continue to score runs, and just to win some more games for the team. I think this unit is a good one”. He also stated that it was important to have some confidence in some of his senior players who could possibly impact the series with the bat. “I can see the hunger. We have been training very hard for the past couple of weeks. I can see that we are trying new things, and they are working pretty well. I have full confidence in this batting unit to get the job done. “John Campbell, Kraigg Brathwaite, young Moseley, myself and Josh – I think, a decent line-up. Once we can stick to our gameplan, I don’t see why we can’t post some good totals,”. Blackwood ended.