Simmons says more communication, better assessment needed by Windies

By Clifton Ross

LOOKING to regain some momentum and a grip on the 5-match series, West Indies head coach Phil Simmons is adamant that his boys will regroup and return to their winning ways come today when the 4th T20 bowls off. The Caribbean hosts drew first blood but lucked out big time in game 2 going down by 16 runs before losing by just a run in game 3 to leave South Africa firmly in charge with a 2-1 lead of the series. During yesterday’s pre-match virtual press conference, Simmons was chock-full with confidence despite coming off two successive losses and pointed out a number of positives which has been impressed with despite the Windies having more work to do.
While batting has been good for the home team, poor shots at times or an ultra-aggressive approach has seemingly worked against the team but Simmons acknowledged these errors and was confident after some talks with his guys that the team will return to their prime form today.

“I think in T20 you have more tinkering to do than in any other format. We have batsmen who can give impetus or steady the fall of wickets and we have to do that in this case. Also, we have batsmen who can play the role of scoring but what we can do as batsmen is assess the situation a lot better than we did and do okay according to the situation.” said Simmons.
Simmons continued to explain, “As batsmen you have to tweak your approach, the perfect example is against Sri Lanka in the last series where Jason (Holder) and Fabian (Allen) batted, that sort of assessment and communication is needed now.”
Speaking of Chris Gayle who missed the last game, the Trinidadian said the T20 ‘Universe Boss’ was good and not carrying any injuries, stating the veteran left-hander “was fine”. He also took some time to praise the likes of pacer Obed McCoy and a returning Shimron Hetmyer.

“We saw him (McCoy) in Sri Lanka, he’s one of those who are grabbing information and asking questions. We continue to push him to improve. It’s good for WI cricket and it’s an enormous help for him to have a guy like Dwayne Bravo on and off the field there to help with T20 bowling and other aspects of the game”. the coach outlined.
Regarding the Guyanese batsman who made a decent effort to get into double figures before being removed by the T20 spin specialist Tabraiz Shamsi, coach Simmons threw his support behind the former West Indies U-19 World Cup winning skipper, should he be selected for the remainder of the series.
“Hetty, the situation eluded him again because he started well. He’s one of the best players of spin in the team, so Shamsi should not be getting him out in a soft way like that. But it was addressed with him, so hopefully if selected for the next game he can look at the situation because he has all the ability”.
Meanwhile, the 4th match bowls off today at 14:00hrs.