Coach welcomes Simmons back

Coach of the Trinidad and Tobago Under-19 cricketers Anthony Gray is happy that senior player Lendl Simmons will be re-joining the team for the Carib Cement regional series. “Last season Lendl missed the series due to commitments with the West Indies ‘A’ team in England and Canada and our batting was not as strong as it could have been. “I am delighted that he is now back with us and will definitely lift the team’s morale. He is a very talented cricketer and has a wonderful cricket brain,” said the former West Indies fast bowler yesterday. Simmons warmed up for the tournament last weekend with a whirlwind 131 against a Secondary Schools XI. Meanwhile the national youth team will enter a five-day camp at the National Cricket Centre, Balmain Village, Couva today. Gray said so far he is pleased with the preparation of the team. He has been doing extensive indoor and outdoor training at the newly laid net facilities.

“The preparation this time around has been going along pretty good and we are happy with the way the players are progressing. We have had extensive weight training for the first time and we have been able to utilise the indoor and outdoor nets. Last weekend we were able to get in some cricket on the outfield and we will be aiming to do that again on Thursday when the national team play an Invitational Under-23 team led by Test batsman Daren Ganga,” said Gray. The lanky Gray also intends to use new coaching methods. ”I will be introducing ‘game sense scenarios’ and this will help toughen up the players. They will be put under mental stress and we will see just how well they respond,” he said. Gray was confident that the TT team will end its 16-year drought, after winning the title way back in 1986. “We are going to Guyana confident and thinking of Trinidad and Tobago. The players are motivated and are going to do this country proud. We have a good manager in Roland Sampath and he can even double by helping in the actual cricket,” said Gray. In four years under the wings of Gray the Trinidad and Tobago team has finished second on three occasions and lost out in the semi-finals on the other.