Joe Root put the blame of the heavy 381-run defeat to the West Indies in the first Test in Barbados on the feet on the batsmen, saying there were “a few very soft dismissals” in the second innings.
England were bowled out for a paltry total of 77 in the first innings in reply to the hosts’ 289. Then, Jason Holder’s double hundred (202*) at No.8 and Shane Dowrich’s 116* kept the England bowlers without a wicket on the third day before Roston Chase’s 8-60 bundled the visitors out for 246 on the fourth.
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“There was a few very soft dismissals in there,” said Root after the match. “In the first innings, there was a little bit of misfortune and West Indies bowled extremely well. But there wasn’t a huge amount on offer for them today. It was disappointing to see some of the dismissals.”
Root added that England are determined to change things around in Antigua when the sides meet for the second of the three Test rubber starting Thursday, January 31.
"Before a game it’s no different to when we’ve been successful. I can’t really explain it. We’ll try and get to the bottom of it."https://t.co/tNmqwhJDxf
— Wisden (@WisdenCricket) January 26, 2019
“It is difficult to take, but just because we’ve had three bad days of cricket – and one really bad hour which swung the Test dramatically – it doesn’t mean we can’t win here,” Root said.
“We are desperate to put it right in Antigua. At no point have we underestimated West Indies.”
There were questions raised on England’s team selection, too. The visitors chose to not play the experienced Stuart Broad and went in with two spinners – Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid – who returned four of the 16 West Indies wickets that fell in the match.
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On the other hand, Holder and his team did well with a four-pronged pace attack, with a five-wicket haul for Kemar Roach and wickets for Alazarri Joseph, Shannon Gabriel and Holder.
Root, however, insisted there was a confidence in the team that this attack was capable of taking 20 wickets.
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“We looked at that wicket and we thought that was an attack that would take 20 wickets on that surface,” he told Sky Sports.
Blaming the batsmen for the loss, he added, “With the depth of that batting, you’d back them to score a lot more runs than that. You have to be realistic that when you are trying to find ways of winning away from home, which is very difficult in this modern era, you are going to get it wrong some times.
"For so long, Holder has been West Indies’ Atlas and Sisyphus, holding up their world and rolling the rock up the hall, only for others – team-mates, members of the administration, and the rest – to roll it back down."https://t.co/SfTaSjui2g
— Wisden (@WisdenCricket) January 26, 2019
“I hold my hand up, we might have got it wrong on this occasion, but we shouldn’t be scared of trying things and finding ways of winning that we wouldn’t have done in the past.”
England had started the away leg of 2018 on a similar note – they were comfortably beaten in the final Ashes Test in Sydney and then were bundled for 58 against New Zealand – but bounced back to win the series against India at home and Sri Lanka away. Root feels it would augur well for his side to bounce back from this defeat rather than dwell on the result.
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“We were miles off where we are as a side this week, but it’ll show our strength of character to come back from that,” he said.
“That’s something we’ve never hidden away from, but we’ve got to make sure we are a far better side when we go to Antigua, and that our minds are very switched on.”
