Poor ticket sales for must-win game

The possibility of no more than 5,000 spectators attending the match exists especially with only 20 percent ticket sales, representing roughly 2,500 spectators, were reported up to 4 pm yesterday, according to West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) marketing manager Darren Millien.

The Windies must turn around a dismal One-Day International (ODI) record at Kensington Oval over the last six seasons, if they are to keep the Digicel five-match series against South Africa alive.

West Indies have lost seven of their last eight ODIs at Kensington, dating back to the controversial 1999 series against Australia.

It is a record which has gone unnoticed by many cricket fans.

The last time West Indies won an ODI match here was on April 25, 1999 — by eight wickets under the Duckworth-Lewis method — against Steve Waugh’s Australians. It levelled a volatile seven-match series 3-3 with the other match declared a tie in Georgetown after a crowd invasion. That win had followed a four-wicket defeat the previous day but it was overshadowed by an ugly bottle-throwing incident after Barbadian opener Sherwin Campbell, later named man-of-the-match as well as man-of-the-series, was adjudged run out after a collision with fast bowler Brendon Julian. Since then the West Indies have been beaten by Pakistan, South Africa, India, Sri Lanka (twice) and England on a ground, long revered as the region’s most famous.

Both teams arrived in Barbados from Kingston at 4.30 am yesterday in the face of sweeping rain after mechanical difficulties prevented their BWIA flight from leaving at the original 2.30 pm, Monday.

West Indies did not practice before 3 pm at the 3Ws Oval, Cave Hill Campus of the University of the West Indies, while South Africa also had an afternoon session at the Police ground, Weymouth in the city.