NEWS
Follow UsKraigg Brathwaite, captain of the West Indies, urged his side not to lose hope and surrender after the innings and 114 runs defeat at Lord’s in the first match of the three-match series against England.
Speaking at the post match presser on July 12 (Friday), Brathwaite said that, on the back of a disappointing batting showing in the first Test, where the Windies got bowled out for 121 & 136, his message to the batters is clear: Test cricket is tough they need to dig deep. The visitors, at Lord's, were unable to bat at least 50 overs in either of the innings (41 in the first and 47 in the second innings).
"For me to the boys [the message] is generally: things will not always go as planned," said the 31-year-old after the game.
“We gotta dig deep, we gotta keep believing and keep stressing on it. It's easy to give up. It's easy to say, 'well, I can't get it done', but we gotta keep believing and keep supporting one another,” he said.
"Batting first, you want to put runs on the board in the first innings especially. We know where we went wrong. We know where we can be better. My thing for the group is stay mentally tough,” highlighted the visiting skipper.
Suffering a hammering in the first Test of the tour is never ideal, but Brathwaite asserted that his side's goal is still to win the series. Currently sixth on the WTC points table, the Windies are still very much alive when it comes to the race to make it to the WTC Final.
"We came to win the Test and it didn't happen. But [there are] still two Tests remaining in this series and we still have six Tests remaining for the year. So it's all a build-up,” said the Bajan batter.
The West Indies bowling was not as bad as their batting. They conceded 371 but were able to bowl out the hosts inside 90 overs. Jayden Seales (4 wickets) and Gudakesh Motie (2/41) bowled well in patches, although they could not get the ideal support from others like Alzarri Joseph, Jason Holder and Shamar Joseph. Brathwaite conceded this and eyed improvement with the ball in the next game, beginning July 18th in Nottingham.
"We got ten wickets. We did bowl them out albeit [for] 50-60 runs too many,” he said, before adding that his side knows how to bounce back.
West Indies are the current holders of the Botham-Richards trophy and haven’t lost more than two games in a row to the English since 2012.
"We all have had some memories, we've all had glimpses of doing great stuff on this level. As I said, we just gotta dig deep. Stay mentally tough,” Brathwaite reiterated.
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