BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – THE Leeward Islands Hurricanes received a sound thrashing from the Trinidad and Tobago Red Force over the weekend at the Warner Park Cricket Stadium and their head coach, Winston Benjamin held no bars in expressing his disappointed with the team’s performance.
The Hurricanes were trounced by and innings and 16 runs.
The home side posted a meager 207 all out in their first innings, before the Denesh Ramdin-led Red Force piled up 360/10.
In their second go at the crease, the Hurricanes came up short and were skittled out for 137.
Benjamin told reporters today (Dec. 4) that he is “disappointed” with the way the team performed, especially collapsing from a position of strength to losing outright.
“I thought on the first day we batted poorly, and we fought back on the second day to put ourselves back in a very good position. And at 101 for 1, not even myself and the assistant coach saw that collapse coming - but unfortunately it did happen, and we now have to go back to the drawing board to try and reassess to find out what really went wrong.”
Benjamin is hopingl that the situation could be changed before the team’s next encounter against the Barbados Pride.
He wants them to “continue where they started at the beginning of the season” – winning their opening encounter before drawing with the Guyana Jaguars.
“It is kind of disheartening when you have such a good start, which we didn’t have for a long time, and to fall back into the old habit. It is not something that we going to let manifest itself.”
Benjamin is adamant that the problem started after the first two games where some of the “guys had become very complacent”.
The head coach added that when complacency steps in, “it would take hard work to get you back to focus on being optimum”.
The Hurricanes management will now be look to prepare the line-up to be mentally fit for the Barbados encounter.
“I think the problem is more mental than physical. I think physically the guys have been preparing continuously throughout. We had a slow start in terms of our preparation, but that has come about leaps and bounds.
“So, I think what we are basically trying to do now is to get into the head of the players and let them try to understand and realise that in order to be successful you have to be consistent,” Benjamin said.
Looking at the season thus far for the Hurricanes, Benjamin summed it up by stating it is “50/50”, owing to the team’s inconsistency.
