Limited-overs skipper Kieron Pollard believes fitness is one major area holding West Indies cricket back at the international level. Pollard has taken serious note of his teammates’ inability to meet the fitness standards set by Cricket West Indies and has urged them to improve and keep up with the rest of the world.
“It has been an issue that has been plaguing us for the last couple of years,”
ESPNcricinfo quoted Pollard as saying ahead of West Indies’ first of three ICC Super League fixtures against Ireland in Jamaica on January 8.
Pollard seems highly unimpressed by the recent axing that Shimron Hetmyer faced from the squad for once again failing to meet the fitness criteria.
“One way to look at it is, the selection policy, the fitness policies are there. Guys know exactly what is needed to represent the West Indian team.
Sometimes, as individuals, we take it for granted. Yes, sometimes it hinders the process of selecting the best players at the given available time,”
he added.
Pollard called the instances of players being unavailable for selection because of their poor fitness standards “frustrating” and called for a change in mentality from individuals, including Hetmyer, where they must “pride themselves on being fit”.
The indirect consequences of senior, experienced high-profile players failing to meet fitness criteria and not being eligible for selection are two-fold: youngsters aren’t inspired to work on their bodies and also have to make an earlier jump than they could afford towards the international stage.
Pollard is aware of this and thus he called for “belief” from those on the side’s fringes and at the domestic level when they arrive at the highest level. West Indies have had a long, painstaking decline in Tests and ODIs, but in recent years, even their T20I record has gone on a downward spiral.
The defending champions failed to make it past the Super 12 stage of the T20 World Cup, winning only one of their five matches after having also endured a sustained slump in T20Is.
Windies have won only 25 and lost 43 of their 75 T20Is since the end of the 2016 T20 World Cup. Having gone down in the rankings, West Indies will be playing the preliminary round at this year’s T20 World Cup in Australia.
