THE TRINIDAD and Tobago cricket team is aiming to top Group “A” in the preliminary round of the Regional T20 Tournament.
After the first week of action at the Sir Vivian Richards Ground in North Sound, Antigua, Trinidad and Tobago, the reigning champions, lost by 11 runs to the Windward Islands on Monday last but responded with a 167-run thumping over the Leeward Islands on Wednesday and a seven-wicket win over Guyana on Friday.
Now the action switches to the Kensington Oval in Bridgetown, Barbados with the final first round matches, plus the semi-finals this Saturday and the final a day later.
The Denesh Ramdin-led TT outfit arrived in Barbados on Saturday night and held their first training session at Weymouth yesterday.
In a telephone interview yesterday, national coach Kelvin Williams noted that, “everything has gone according to plan.”
“We have another one (this) morning and one on Wednesday,” he said, referring to the training sessions. “Everything seems to be in place. I don’t see anything bothering us at this present time.”
Asked about the ground conditions in Kensington, Williams replied, “We haven’t been at the venue. We would be practising on the venue on Wednesday (tomorrow).
“There are four matches (at Kensington) carded before we actually play on Thursday. We’ll have a look at (the pitch) on Thursday morning.”
Looking back at the team’s performances in Antigua, the national coach reflected, “We all know the first game didn’t go according to plan. We stumbled there.
“It’s nice to know that when we stumble, we could pick ourselves up,” he continued. “The game against the Leeward Islands showed our intent. It’s nice to know that we bounced back, especially in the manner that we did it. It was fantastic.
“We came up against Guyana and it’s a team that we’ve never beaten in the competition, in T20. To actually roll them over like that, again that shows us that we’ve been progressing and we’ve been progressing strongly.”
Trinidad and Tobago will close off their Group “A” phase with a meeting against Canada on Thursday.
At the moment, the TT squad are atop the five-team group with eight points, the same as the Windwards but with a superior net run-rate. Guyana and the Leewards have four points apiece while the Canada is yet to earn a point.
“With the momentum at this point in time, I just hope that we just take it into the final preliminary match against Canada,” Williams said.
“Everyone will look at it and say “Canada is an easy side”. I always say you have to play cricket to win it.
“Our run-rate is superior to the rest in the group and we need to maintain that,” he continued. “We need to go out there and put a clinical display against Canada and hope that the other teams falter and we can finish at the top of our group.”
Williams insists the team will not be complacent against the hapless Canadians.
“It’s a game that we have to win and win convincingly,” he stated. “So long as everybody’s fit, we’ve got to go out there with our best team for that particular match.”
Concerning the camaraderie in the team, Williams said, “I’ve got to be honest. After the defeat against the Windward Islands, I think the team actually pulled themselves together.
“It’s a group of professional cricketers and a lot of them have the experience. From then on, we realised we’re in a contest and we have a job to do.
“The camaraderie is magnificent, it’s fantastic,” he ended.
(Source http://www.newsday.co.tt/sport/0,153827.html)
