Middle order batsman Darren Bravo has not been selected for the first two matches of the West Indies Professional cricket league.
Bravo was one of the players who aborted the tour of India recently. Chairman of the national selection panel Alec Burns told the T&T Guardian that Bravo had not indicated his willingness to play for this country, since his return from India.
“We planned a meeting for him to attend to discuss his availability for the matches and after agreeing to attend, he did not come to the meeting. He did not communicate with us to let us know why he did not attend.
“We took this to mean that he was not interested in playing at this time.”
When asked why the selection panel did not contact the player, after he did not show up for the meeting, Burns, a former national pacer, said, “What about the player calling us? Wasn’t it in his interest to call and let us know that he could not make the meeting but was still interested in playing the cricket?
“These players need to understand that it is in their interest to communicate with the selectors to let them know of their availability.”
Another notable absentee from the team to play Barbados from Friday at the Oval is pacer Ravi Rampaul. Burns revealed that Rampaul would be out of the country, since his wife is having a baby.
“He would not be available at this time and we understood his position.”
Meanwhile, the lone Red Force import, Ramnaresh Sarwan, has been included in the 13-man squad and together with opener Lendl Simmons and former captain Denesh Ramdin, will have the job of leading the batting.
Coach Gus Logie is confident of a good showing: “We want to take it a step further and go all the way this time. We have spoken about the objective of winning the Regional 4-Day tournament and the NAGICO Super 50 tournament. We have a mix of youth and experience, but we see the coming season as a challenge and to establish ourselves as a force in the four-day format in particular and this new season and format gives us the perfect opportunity to do so.
“Our batting has not consistently scored runs, particularly the kind of big individual scores and totals that put you in a position to win four-day matches. It’s an area that we have tried to work very hard correcting and so we are really looking forward to the players really going out and batting for long periods and accumulating the big scores and totals that would allow our bowlers the opportunity to put pressure on the opposition.”
The former West Indies batsman is looking to Sarwan to lend his valuable experience: “We had a number of young and exciting players but we needed a player that could bring a lot more stability and experience in the middle order, so that’s why we chose Ramnaresh. We are looking forward to him bringing not just runs but his experience that he will mentor our younger players so that they can learn from him.
Red Force team
Evin Lewis, Lendl Simmons, Yannick Ottley, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Jason Mohammed, Denesh Ramdin, Akeal Hosein, Imran Khan, Rayad Emrit (capt), Shannon Gabriel, Marlon Richards, Bryan Charles, Yannic Carriah
