West Indies captain Denesh Ramdin is calling on the makers of cricket helmets to improve on their product, in light of the death of Australian batsman Phillip Hughes, who was felled by a bouncer from Sean Abbott.
Ramdin made the comments as the West Indies left the Caribbean yesterday for South Africa to engage that country in a three-Test series.
Ramdin said: “The helmets that we have needsto be improved because when you get a lash on it, you really feel the pain. It is basically just a piece of fibreglass and this is not adequate protection.”
There is no international benchmark for standards on helmets and the International Cricket Council (ICC) had put a committee in place to look at this in 2013.
Now with the death of hughes, they were likely to fastrack this process, so that helmet manufacturers will have to make a specific grade in order to be used on the market.
Meanwhile, Ramdin said that his team will be looking to give South Africa a run for their money.
“This team is very tough but we have good players on our team and we are going to give them a run. We just need to keep focus and do the right things consistently and we will get the results we want,” he said.
“The senior players including myself have to lead from the front and the younger players have to take their lead.”
The West Indies open their tour with a warm-up match against a South African Invitational XI at Benoni on December 10 and this will be followed by the first Test, to be played at Centurion on December 17.
They then play the Boxing Day Test match at Port Elizabeth on December 26 and the final game starts on January 2 at Capetown.
After this three T20s and five ODIs will be played before the team returns home for the short break, ahead of the World Cup in New Zealand and Australia in February.