Lara slams Jamaican grounds

WEST INDIES cricket captain Brain Lara has criticised the condition of the venues used by the Trinidad and Tobago team in the current Red Stripe Bowl regional one-day tournament in Jamaica. The gifted left-handed batsman, holder of two world records, described the grounds as “dangerous” and blamed it for the recent injury to promising young batsman Dwayne Bravo. In fact Lara said he almost sprained his ankle while practising with his teammates at the University of the West Indies Grounds at Mona in the opening match against the Leeward Islands on October 1. “The ground looks good but I twisted my ankle chasing a ball. If I were more injury prone I could have been hurt seriously,” said Lara. While practising at the Melbourne Ground on monday, Bravo hurt his ankle and was initially ruled out of tomorrow’s crucial match against the Windward Islands at Kensington Park.

However Lara said yesterday the prognosis for Bravo looks promising and he may be fit to play tomorrow after all. “Bravo is a vital part of the team’s batting and we would hate to lose him this way,” said Lara. He said the risk was posed to the players as cricket officials attempt to take the game to the country areas in an effort to attract the involvement of the communities. The WI captain was speaking at the Hilton Trinidad yesterday at a media conference to announce a sponsorship deal with TSTT. In attendance were TSTT”s Chief Executive Officer Sam Martin; Lisa Agard, Executive Vice-President, Legal, Regulatory and Public Policy, Cable and Wireless (West Indies); Christian Mouttet, chairman of TSTT and Rae Ann Harpe Walters, Corporate Communications manager, TSTT. Lara said the TT team, led by talented opening batsman Daren Ganga is quite capable of winning the regional tournament and echoed the opinion of team manager Omar Khan who recently stated that if the senior players lead by example, the younger members would try very hard to emulate them.
  
Lara said he was pleased with the performance of the team so far, pointing out that Ganga had played a valuable part in the defeat of the Leewards on October 1. Lara also came good in the next encounter against Canada on October 4 piloting the team to their second consecutive victory. He said in the past the TT bowlers did not perform up to par and this placed a great strain on the overall team effort, but he expects the younger players to make their contribution and win a regional championship after several years. Lara also said it was unfortunate that Jamaican fast bowler Jermaine Lawson may be ruled out of the upcoming West Indies tour to Zimbabwe and South Africa since he is going to Australia to do remedial work on his action to satisfy the International Cricket Council (ICC). He expects the West Indies selectors to meet shortly to pick the squad for the four-month sojourn when he is widely expected to be retained as captain. He expressed great confidence in the young crop of players and singled out Barbadian Fidel Edwards and Jamaican Jerome Taylor as bowlers who will soon make their mark in Test cricket. “We have a good mixture of youth and experience and will prepare the foundation for West Indies to occupy the top for many years,” Lara said.