West Indies players must prove fitness or be axed from touring squad

Ryon Jones, Gleaner Writer

The 15 players who have been selected for West Indies' upcoming tour to Sri Lanka are not guaranteed of making the trip, as all the players will have to undergo fitness assessment before departing for the tour.

This is just one of a number of steps that the West Indies Cricket Board is taking to move the regional team forward. This comes on the heels of Ramnaresh Sarwan's omission from the squad because of fitness concerns.

"We are having a camp in Barbados starting on the 27th, which the first two days of that camp will address the fitness issues," West Indies coach, Ottis Gibson, stated during a press conference held at The Jamaica Pegasus yesterday.

"There will be fitness testing on those first two days and fitness assessment will be made on players and then we will make decisions as we go forward from there," he added.

Tough decision

Gibson, however, pointed out that it was a tough decision to leave Sarwan out of the squad, but believes a message had to be sent.

"It is a tough decision leaving anybody out and especially a player of Sarwan's ability. He has done well for West Indies," Gibson pointed out. "It was a tough decision, it was a decision that took some deliberation but it came down to whether we can continue to take Sarwan on tour and then have one of our best players not available to us for selection all the time."

The West Indies coach is of the view that other players, such as Jamaica's Jerome Taylor, have to do more to keep themselves injury-free.

"It is a message to everybody playing cricket in West Indies ... the Sarwan incident, the Ryan Hinds, everybody else out there who has come to the West Indies team in the past and played their cricket with injury problems needs to address those," Gibson cited.

"It is the same for Jerome Taylor, a fully fit Jerome Taylor is an advantage to us but Jerome Taylor goes on tour and Jerome is not available for selection all the time, it creates a huge problem.

"Those problems have to be addressed and we took the decision to address those problems at selection of the team by picking the team rather than waiting until we get on tour and have the problems creep up," he explained.

Meanwhile, Darren Sammy admitted that he has never dreamt of being elevated to the post of West Indies captain, but now that he has been given the role, he sees his greatest challenge as that of getting the team to start winning.

"Over the years, our results have not been very good, so my biggest challenge will be to get the team to really bring the results that the West Indian people want," said Sammy.

"It is going to take time but I have full confidence in coach Ottis Gibson's ability," he added.

Vice-captain Brendan Nash is very happy with his appointment and is looking forward to the challenge.

"Most of all I think I have worked well on the field in my short time with the West Indies team and this position will allow me to sort of help the coach and the captain to move in the direction that they are looking to."