Southampton: After a shock loss to Bangladesh, West Indies are willing to admit that they are in a tough situation following their string of defeats. When West Indies skipper Jason Holder was asked about his team’s chances of reaching the semi-final after they lost to Bangladesh on Monday, he said: “It’s looking tough at this moment, but it’s not impossible. We have to play every game from now on as a final. We’ve got to win every game left to give ourselves a really good chance.”
Holder acknowledged that they had bowled and fielded very badly and the turning point was when Shakib Al Hasan’s catch was not taken by Shannon Gabriel off Andre Russell. “I felt we missed a crucial chance there. Shannon should have gone in and taken the catch. A few top edges didn’t go our way, probably. But surely we didn’t help ourselves in the field as well.”
Though his team posted 321 for 8, Holder feels that they were at least 40 runs short. But in his typical West Indies style, he appreciated the Bangladesh batsmen, “We needed new ball wickets but did not get that today. They batted well. Shakib came in really well. And Liton Das played well too ... got to give them credit.”
Holder feels that for the dimensions of the Taunton ground, a huge total is a must. “I reckon a par-score on this wicket and a ground with this dimension would be around 360-370 and we were well short of that. We should have rotated the strike a little better and found the boundary with a little more freedom.”
The skipper has all odds stacked against them for Holder to admit that it is tough for them since their next matches are all against strong teams. “We’ve got to beat the best. India is going to be a tough game. Then we play New Zealand as well. So we’ve got to be a lot more clinical with the ball, and still go a lot further with the bat. I don’t think we’ve got a batsman with a century yet — so we need to urgently fix these areas.”
