Cricket

GAYLE WANTS CLEAR MINDS IN QUEST TO LEVEL DIGICEL SERIES

Saturday, March 21 – Providence Stadium, Georgetown, Guyana:  West Indies captain Chris Gayle has told his players to quickly get over the deflating manner of Friday’s defeat in the opening Digicel One-Day International against England and come fully focused for Sunday’s second contest in the five-match Digicel ODI Series 2009. “I spoke about trying to clear our minds as quickly as possible because we have a long way to go in this series,” Gayle said on Saturday. “It’s only the first game but we have a very important game tomorrow again and we have to try and get back into winning ways.” The powerful Jamaican was frank about the mood in the camp following coach John Dyson’s miscalculation that handed England a one run victory on the Duckworth/Lewis system and a 1-0 lead in the series:  “To be honest, it affected us badly because every game we want to win.  It really hurt us.” It was a case that actually for a long while the players were very, very depressed after losing that game. It’s a mind thing.  What I said to the guys was ‘it’s how well we can bounce back from these sorts of situations.” Gayle admitted the final moments of the match were as frenetic off the field as on it:  “Messages were being sent out to the batters. Batters who were into bat next were aware of the situation.  We sat down there together and we checked it and double checked it but we didn’t double check it with any match referee or any other person.” Gayle said that Dyson, who took responsibility for the error after the match, was assessing the situation after every ball but that they failed to read the right figure once the seventh wicket fell. That wicket, Denesh Ramdin LBW to Stuart Broad, actually put the West Indies behind on the D/L for the first time in the closing overs.  “The coach had it (the D/L sheet) in his hand and we were going through it. At some stage he was actually right beside me looking at it as well,” Gayle said. “Basically, it was just a mistake after we lost that wicket. Then it was a miscalculation. We should have been in the next zone. That last wicket actually cost us the game there. “It was a basic error from our point of view. We have to look at it as just one of those things.  We have a game to play tomorrow so we try and put that behind us and focus on what we have to do tomorrow. Hopefully we can square the series 1-1.”.

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