DELHI TEST
I don’t think the guys are lacking confidence, said Chase © Getty
Roston Chase, the West Indies skipper, expressed optimism about his team’s chances of bouncing back from the heavy defeat in Ahmedabad as they look to script a turnaround in the second Test against India, starting Friday in New Delhi.
India thoroughly dominated the first Test, losing only five wickets en route to their victory by an innings and 140 runs. Yet, Chase believes the scope to bring about a change has to start soon.
“Obviously, we’re really down right now, but it has to change at some point. And the change can start from now, but it starts with the belief and the mindset of each and every player, and just to keep motivating the guys that we can still play some positive cricket and change around,” Chase said on Thursday, ahead of the second Test.
West Indies’ issues largely starts with their batters’ inability to stay at the crease for long periods.”I just think it’s a matter of confidence and continuously playing quality, like first-class cricket, and so on,” Chase said. “Just that know-how of going out there and facing good attacks for longer periods, and obviously, trying to improve on faults that you may have picked up early on in your career.
“When you first start, no one really knows you. And then obviously, you play a couple of games, and then people see your weaknesses and try to exploit them. So it’s just for the players to just try to improve on those weaknesses from as early as possible.”
He denied the issue being batters’ confidence, and believes the challenge for the batters at this point is the absence of big scores.
“I don’t think the guys are lacking confidence, but it’s just to get that one score, to get that start, to then kick on from there. Once you get that good innings or that 100 or that big 50, that then gives you the confidence to know that I can absolutely do it. But I think everyone is confident, but when you get out there, and if we don’t start well as a batting unit, then the pressure is on.
“It’s for us to soak up that pressure as batters and still find a way to score and put back the pressure on to the Indian bowlers. So I just think that that is the biggest challenge for us. I don’t think that we’re not confident, I just think that we just need to get that start and kick on and we’ll be fine.”
Speaking of his own form, Chase admitted that even as he is feeling good following a run of decent scores in white-ball cricket, the challenge would be to quickly adapt to the demands of Test cricket.
“In the first game, I was looking good, feeling good in the first innings. And I got good delivery. I thought that I could have played it better. But as I said, I’m feeling good (about my batting). Obviously, coming off some good form in white-ball cricket against Pakistan and going into CPL and had some good performances, I feel good as a batter. But Test cricket is a different format, so you have to bat for longer periods.
“That’s where the challenge comes in now. Rather than batting for 100 balls, you probably have to bat for 200 balls. They say, to make a Test entry it takes four sessions. (So you’re just digging deep for those four sessions and trying to stay in, and not what has happened before in terms of a ball before or the over before.”
“I just think staying in the present is the biggest challenge for me right now. So that’s just something that I have to cope with.”
© Cricbuzz
