by Neto Baptiste
Former West Indies fast bowler, Sir Curtly Ambrose, has rubbished the notion that West Indies was expected to beat Bangladesh based solely on the premise that the regional squad may be higher-ranked than their opponents.
His remarks come on the heels of a seven-wicket victory for the West Indies over Bangladesh in the first Test here at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium on Sunday, wrapping up the contest early on the fourth day.
“Now, that will always be a talking point that Bangladesh is ranked below the West Indies so you expect West Indies to beat them; I don’t believe in that sort of fairytale. They are both international teams and whether they are ranked above you or below you, you have to play well enough to win. And, having said that, I am sure that a lot of those same people talking about the quality of the opposition, if Bangladesh had won this Test match you would not have heard the end of it; so I can’t deal with that kind of talking,” he said.
John Campbell hit the winning six as the home team needed to bat for only seven overs on the fourth day to beat Bangladesh by seven wickets at the North Sound venue.
West Indies finished on 88 for three after resuming the fourth day on 49 for three in the second innings, needing 35 more runs to clinch the series opener.
Sir Curtly said that as a team and as fans, we should just celebrate the victory.
“Well, the end result is always the most important and West Indies won the game quite convincingly, so that’s good news for them, because they were the better team throughout. When you can bowl out a Test team just after lunch for 103 on the first day, then that team will be under tremendous pressure. From thereon, it’s going to be an uphill battle for them to get back into the game and West Indies batted them out of the game when they got that 162 runs first innings lead,” he said.
West Indies scored 265 in the first innings. Bangladesh had 103 and 245 in their first and second innings respectively. Kemar Roach was named Player of the Match for this match haul of six for 74.
Sir Curtly said his only drawback was the home team’s slow scoring rate in the first innings where, at one point, they scored at one run per over.
“I believe that the scoring rate for the West Indies was a little bit slow, in my opinion. They could have maybe played a little more aggressively and shown a little more positive intent to score, which didn’t happen. So, they were scoring a little too slow for my liking. Having said all of that, at the end of the day we got the results convincingly and I guess that’s what matters,” the former player said.
The second and final Test starts Friday in St Lucia.