During the course of the series, Da Silva has been part of many crucial partnerships to help West Indies out of the woods

Mohammad Isam12-Feb-2021When he was asked about the key factors behind their stunning win in the first Test in Chattogram, West Indies coach Phil Simmons highlighted the importance of partnerships, among the first things he mentioned. Certainly, the batting partnerships have been West Indies’ biggest weapon in this series, and the common name in many crucial stands has been Joshua Da Silva.Da Silva added 99 for the sixth wicket with Jermaine Blackwood in the first innings in Chattogram, which helped West Indies get past the follow-on score.After Kyle Mayers and Nkrumah Bonner stitched together 216 in the second innings, Da Silva and Mayers added 100 for the sixth wicket to take the side to the cusp of victory. One might say that Da Silva’s contribution was only 20, but with Blackwood having got out shortly before, a wicket at that stage would have brought Bangladesh back into the game.On Friday, in the first innings of the second Test in Dhaka, Da Silva top-scored with 92, and as much as he felt miserable to miss out on a maiden Test century, he once again showed the way of combining with other batsmen to put the pressure back on the opposition. He was involved in an 88-run sixth-wicket stand with Bonner, which again got West Indies out of the woods when they had been reduced to 178 for 5 on the first day.But what has perhaps changed the complexion of the game was his 118-run seventh-wicket stand with No. 9 Alzarri Joseph. A developing allrounder, Joseph contributed 71 runs in the partnership and as much as that hurt Bangladesh’s footing in the game, Da Silva’s presence at the other end ensured the bowlers had nowhere to go for a considerably long time on the second day.Joseph offered an interesting insight into how Da Silva guided the partnership, by breaking down their task into the blocks of ten runs. According to Joseph, Da Silva has been a seasoned presence at crease despite playing only his third Test.Joshua Da Silva and Alzarri Joseph mixed caution with aggression in perfect measure during their stand•AFP / Getty Images”[Da Silva’s] encouragement to build partnerships, to look at small totals, every ten runs, start over from zero again to score another ten runs, and again another ten runs, and in a matter of no time, we had an 80-run partnership.”When I came to the crease, it was just to bat some time and support Josh at the crease. Josh has been batting really well. It is only his third Test and he is showing real maturity with the bat and also behind the stumps. His game is coming along really well.”At least during the course of this tour, Da Silva has improved from a rookie who was dropped from the ODI side after two single-digit scores to a reliable batsman in the Test side.Things that have stood out in his batting are his soft hands while defending the ball, as well as the use of the depth of the crease while cutting or pulling the spinners. Da Silva said that he has been working on this aspect with the batting coach Monty Desai.”I have always been a good player of spin, so I adapted my game to lower wickets. It is a little similar to home but in a different situation, so I am playing my part. I try to pick the line and length as early as possible. I worked with Monty, our batting coach, on moving forward and back positively and making that decision early.”Resuming the day on 22, Da Silva hit several punches off the back foot through the off side, as well as collected plenty of runs by gliding the ball behind point. It forced the Bangladesh spinners to bowl more at the stumps, and that gave Da Silva the opportunity to play the pulls and sweeps. He even brought out the reverse sweep a couple of times.Da Silva is among a group of young cricketers that the West Indies team management has been carrying around during the pandemic. He went to England to play the two practice matches, and even kept wickets during the Manchester Test after Shane Dowrich got injured. He made his Test debut in the subsequent New Zealand tour, where he showed his temperament with a second-innings fifty.Da Silva gives West Indies an interesting little conundrum when Dowrich becomes available in the near future. Certainly, a competition for the wicketkeeping spot will strengthen the Test side.Da Silva’s batting improvement also means he has a chance of playing only as a batsman, too. His ability to put together partnerships, particularly in a tour where he had to learn on the fly, is going to work in his favour in the coming months.

Coach Dave Houghton has created “a happier place” in the team, and young quick Evans is among the players benefiting from the change

Danyal Rasool16-Oct-2022There was a bit of a stir when Zimbabwe finally unveiled their men’s T20 World Cup kit, just a few days out from their first game of the tournament, against Ireland on Monday. The crimson red had been replaced by a fiery yellow, with an image of the bird that symbolises an independent Zimbabwe. That bird isn’t a phoenix, but, in that orange against the clear yellow, it looks almost aflame, ready to rise from the ashes.Which is perhaps apt. Because just four months ago, it looked like Zimbabwe wouldn’t need to design a World Cup kit at all. They had just played T20I series at home against Namibia and Afghanistan, and lost both. And at the World Cup qualifiers, one loss could have put paid to their chances. Their chances of getting to the tournament were iffy. But they made it.Related

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No player’s fortune embodies what Zimbabwe cricket went through in this time – both the nadir and the rebirth – as well as Brad Evans’. Evans, the 25-year-old fast bowler, made his debut against Namibia in May. With Zimbabwe losing the final two games of that series, it would perhaps have felt more like a hazing ceremony than an induction.”As a Zimbabwe side, we are starting almost from rock bottom,” he tells ESPNcricinfo. “When I joined, we lost to Namibia in a five-match T20 series. That’s rock bottom.”He doesn’t want to talk much about his time under former coach Lalchand Rajput, pointing out that he wasn’t there long enough to form a nuanced opinion. But when he speaks about Dave Houghton’s arrival, he sits up in his chair. The eyes sparkle; the contrast he draws need not be put into words.”Forget the cricket. The changing room between the two series that I played is such a different place. It’s jovial, guys are making jokes. It’s just a happier place,” Evans said. “The only thing that Dave has come in and done is said, ‘Guys, I don’t care if you get out, but I want you to play your shots’. So you’ll see someone play a terrible shot and you’ll think, ‘Oh, my god, what do you think the coach is going to say to him?'”But Dave will actually just ask him about his thought process and say, ‘Maybe try this next time; but I like the way you batted today’. That gives that same guy the freedom to go out next time and still try and express himself. He doesn’t hammer guys for getting things wrong because at the end of the day, we’re all human.”

“If you have 11 guys being aggressive, the chances are two or three of them are going to come off on any given day,” he says. “And the day that five or six guys come off on a day, we’re going to beat anyone in the world”

Comparisons with Bazball are easily drawn, even though Houghton, in an interview with ESPNcricinfo, had declined to get into them, saying Brendon McCullum “was a slightly bigger player doing it with a slightly bigger side”.But in the last three months under him, Zimbabwe have scorched their way through the World Cup qualifiers, beaten Bangladesh in T20I and ODI series, come within inches of a win against India, and won a first-ever ODI in Australia.Evans was part of three of those four campaigns, taking five wickets in an ODI against India and hitting the winning runs off Mitchell Starc in Townsville. “I was quite disappointed, though, because we needed one to win and I hit the ball and it went for four. But because we ran the single, they only gave me one,” he says in mock frustration. “No one’s going to even know that I cover-drove Mitchell Starc for four.”Such excitability would have been unthinkable in May. The confidence – the swagger, even – this purple patch has bred, streams through in everything Evans says about his still-new international career. While Houghton’s decades-long experience meant he was content to play it down gently, Evans’ youthful exuberance allows him to play up Zimbabwe’s World Cup chances.”It’s jovial, guys are making jokes. It’s just a happier place,” Evans says about the Zimbabwe change room since Dave Houghton has taken over as coach•ICC via Getty”If you have 11 guys being aggressive, the chances are two or three of them are going to come off on any given day,” he says. “And the day that five or six guys come off on a day, we’re going to beat anyone in the world.”A pause follows that statement, but Evans ends it by doubling down. “Honestly, we’re not untalented cricketers. Everyone can play a cover drive or a sweep shot. Everyone can bowl an awayswinger. Everyone can spin the ball. The day five or six people fire in a day, there’s no one we can lose to,” he stresses. “We can take big teams further. We’re just trying to get into the swing of things. This is the way we want to play and hopefully guys are pulling in the same direction. That’s what we’re after.”His words struggle to keep up with his emotions, and it almost feels like he’s producing an impromptu team talk. It suddenly becomes clear how much buy-in Houghton has managed to achieve in such a short time.”The way that Dave structures his training sessions is telling,” Evans says. “The other day, we batted in pairs. You had six overs in pairs to bat and try and score as many runs as possible. It was quite intense because we’ve got a squad of 15 guys all trying to put their hands up and get into the playing XI for the World Cup. There was no consequence for getting out. Normally a coach might say, right, we’re doing this drill, and if you get out, it’s minus five runs or something like that.

“West Indies are beatable, but at the same time, they can beat anyone else in the world. If they have a day out, they’re going to be tricky to beat. But at the same time, they can have a bad day and they can be poor and we can have a good day and beat them”Brad Evans

“With the idea that if I get out, it’s just a dot ball, there’s so much freedom to play your shots. And you should have seen the quality of cricket that was on display in that little centre-wicket training. It was ridiculous.”

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Zimbabwe’s dearth of fast-bowling resources has been well documented, as has the tendency for any exciting prospect they do produce to end up in other, more affluent parts of the world. Evans looked like he was on a similar trajectory when he left St John’s College in Harare – a prestigious institution that has produced several world-class athletes – a year before finishing, accepting a sports scholarship to Cardiff University. He had a future in county cricket in mind, and eventually a British passport.”I did really well whilst I was at school,” he says. “I was playing Sussex second team. But then once I left school, it wasn’t allowed anymore because I was on a different type of visa. So I actually had to stop playing second-team cricket overall.”He was faced with the prospect of a frustrating wait for a passport that could take several years. “I just looked at my life and I thought, by the time I leave uni, I’m going to be 23 years old. And in that time, I wouldn’t have been able to play much cricket. I felt like my cricket was on the decline. So about halfway through university, I sort of made up my mind that I was going to come back to Zimbabwe and pursue my career here.”Evans possesses the self-belief and confidence elite sport seems to demand as a prerequisite, but tempers it with disarming self-deprecation. He says, almost matter-of-factly, that he “had visions of playing for Zimbabwe at 18” and was confident he was good enough. He talks about becoming a batting allrounder by the end of his career, “someone like Ben Stokes”. But immediately after, he insists he isn’t comparing himself with Stokes, and a few minutes later, even laughs off the idea that he was always destined to be a fast bowler for Zimbabwe.Brad Evans celebrates after cover-driving Mitchell Starc to win the game for Zimbabwe•AFP/Getty Images”Fast bowling happened because I started sliding down the batting order,” he says with a laugh. “Growing up, I was an opening batter and quite a good one. There came a stage where I did have a growth spurt and then I just thought, why not bowl?”My first three years of bowling fast, I remember there was one game where I bowled 60 extras. I could not control the ball. And the opposition made around 140 and 60 of those were my extras. But I could bowl quickly. By the age of 14, I’d broken two people’s arms by bowling bouncers. So I could bowl quickly, but I just couldn’t control it.”All that despite never really receiving much professional fast-bowling coaching. “Gary Brent [former Zimbabwe fast bowler] tried to get me to bowl a little bit more front on and I think I took a little bit just before I did my ankle a year and a half ago,” he says. “But apart from that, I’ve always been a free spirit and just gone out there and played my cricket the way I play my cricket.”It is an attitude well suited to Houghton’s philosophy. He had said he wouldn’t consider his side to have qualified for the World Cup until they reached the Super 12 stage of the tournament, and it’s a message he appears to have drilled into his players well. Evans accepts the opening game against Ireland is a must-win, and feels even West Indies could be beaten.”West Indies are beatable, but at the same time, they can beat anyone else in the world. If they have a day out, they’re going to be tricky to beat. But at the same time, they can have a bad day and they can be poor and we can have a good day and beat them,” he says. “We’re not going there to come back before the main World Cup starts.”If Zimbabwe can manage to scale these lofty heights over the next week in Hobart, it won’t just be that dashing yellow kit causing a stir. And this time, everyone will notice if Evans cover-drives Starc for four.

Though he made key contributions with bat and ball, his drop of Kieron Pollard in the 19th over turned out to be expensive

S Rajesh17-Apr-2021Vijay Shankar had a more-than-reasonable game with both bat and ball tonight: he took the key wickets of Rohit Sharma and Suryakumar Yadav, finishing with excellent figures of 2 for 19 in three overs, and in difficult batting conditions, scored a 25-ball 28 that kept the Sunrisers in the game even as wickets were falling at the other end. According to ESPNcricinfo’s Smart Stats, based only on the batting and bowling stats, he was third in terms of impact points for the game, next only to Rahul Chahar and Jonny Bairstow. And yet, his one error in the field undid much of that good work and might have been a factor in the Sunrisers’ defeat.ESPNcricinfo LtdOff the third ball of the 19th over, with Kieron Pollard on 18 off 16 balls, Shankar dropped a straightforward chance at deep midwicket. Pollard faced only five more balls after that drop – he also got a single off that delivery – but creamed 16 runs, including consecutive sixes off the last two balls.According to ESPNcricinfo’s Luck Index, that chance cost Sunrisers nine runs. That is calculated through a complex algorithm, which takes into account the quality of the batters to follow and puts a number to the runs that the other batters would have scored off the extra deliveries that Pollard faced.In this case, the algorithm calculates that had Pollard been dismissed, the remaining batters would have scored just eight runs off the five balls that Pollard faced after the chance. That would have given the Sunrisers a target of 142 to win, and not 151.You could argue that the Sunrisers fell short of that target too, but then the approach of the batters would have been different – especially in the last few overs – had the Sunrisers required nine fewer runs. Shankar might have had the luxury of playing out Jasprit Bumrah instead of having to take him on, for instance.That is in the realms of conjecture, but what is almost certain is that the let-off made the Sunrisers’ target steeper. On a difficult pitch against a high-quality line-up, that target proved to be too big an ask.

Decision to scrap meaningless final day of warm-up a further sign of England’s new mindset

Vithushan Ehantharajah25-Nov-2022Friday in Abu Dhabi was meant to be day three of England’s warm-up against the Lions. That was until Ben Stokes put it to the Test squad that something more productive could be achieved, rather than simply completing the match.The result was irrelevant – a day’s batting for 501 for seven on Wednesday had given way to chasing 77 overs’ worth of leather for 411 for 9 on Thursday – so the skipper floated to his team-mates that perhaps a two-hour session of middle practice and nets would see them right, ahead of their flight to Pakistan on Saturday morning. The reaction was unanimous.”We went around our group and we asked where everyone was at, and what they felt like they needed,” Stokes said, when explaining the change of plans.”Sometimes with the warm-up games, you can get into the last day of that and it becomes a thankless task, and you don’t get out of it what you really wanted to. I thought the first two days were really good. The lads got a real good opportunity to bat out in the middle and obviously spent all day in the field yesterday.”I feel as a group, we’re in a position now where we can go and ask the individuals exactly what we need without forcing them into doing something. We’ve all played a lot of cricket now, and everyone came back with the feedback that they would probably feel more benefit out of getting more volume in the nets and working on skills.”What we know of Stokes as captain, and the ethos instilled by him and head coach Brendon McCullum, could never have been more distilled. Convention bordering on politeness would have meant bringing the game to a conclusion. But why not do what you need to do, instead of what others think you should? There was even talk that the management might ask the ground-staff to scuff up the pitch in the morning for a day’s worth of training against spin, to prepare for the possibility of encountering a similar surface deep into one of the upcoming Tests in Rawalpindi, Multan or Karachi.Stokes’ first visit on the middle came during Friday’s ad-hoc practice, where he bowled a few overs alongside Jofra Archer – who gave Ben Duckett a torrid time ahead of returning home to the UK – before batting. Stokes himself had played no part in the match, instead watching on from the sidelines between net sessions, massages and a few long, gruelling sessions on a stationary bike in 30-degree heat. He was suitably impressed by what he saw.England’s Test squad look on during their final day of practice in Abu Dhabi•ECB Images”That first day, obviously the scorecard looks ridiculous,” he said. “But I think looking at it finer than that, you look at the way Zak and Ducky applied themselves early on with the new ball, when it was actually doing a bit, but still looked to put the pressure back on them whenever they could. Then we got into a position of about 300, 350 – the way Livi and Will Jacks went out and played is exactly what we’re on about when we get into those positions, especially out here in the subcontinent, rather than simply letting the game flow and not taking anything on really.”With the ball, it’s an incredibly flat wicket, so it was a good opportunity for the lads to be out of their comfort zone when you’ve got lads coming hard at you. I think two spells into the bowlers, a day in the dirt, that’s exactly what we want when we’ve got a big tour coming up.”Stokes also made special mention of Haseeb Hameed, who scored 145 for the Lions against a strong attack featuring James Anderson, Ollie Robinson, Jamie Overton and Jack Leach. He produced 20 fours, two sixes and plenty of intent that pleased Stokes – including the fact that Hameed had sought out conversations with director of men’s cricket Rob Key and McCullum.”He [Hameed] played incredibly well yesterday,” Stokes said. “He’s someone you wouldn’t necessarily have down for that type of innings, but me and Baz were watching him play.”He has had conversations with Rob and Baz about what he needs to do to get back in the team, and he’s obviously listened. It’s amazing to see a player like Hass, who has done what he’s done over five or six years, has realised the potential that he can play that way, against our front-line attack. I think it’s amazing to see what messaging, when it’s clear and precise, can do for a player. it’s great to see that filtering down to the Lions group here.”They were told when they came to the camp, the way in which we operate. Hass can take a lot of credit, he’s listened to the conversation about how to get into the team, and is actually implementing it. It wasn’t just yesterday, he did it throughout the summer.”This hasn’t been your usual training week. It began with a visit to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix for qualifying and race day last weekend, an excursion set up by Stokes via his Red Bull connections. Golf has featured regularly – of course – and the vibe throughout training has been kept constant by McCullum’s wireless speakers. The Kiwi even called in contacts at Kolkata Knight Riders to secure the luxurious Ritz Carlton Hotel.Ahead of restricted movements in Pakistan due to the level of security, this week has been about enjoyment and, by proxy, reinforcing the freedom England cracked so well in the summer to win six out of seven Tests. Over that period, there has been a lot of outward talk about messaging and buy-in from players. Internally, however, there has not been as much direct supplementation, as there was at Lord’s ahead of the South Africa series when Stokes felt compelled to pull out a whiteboard to reaffirm the team’s principles. This time, no such aids were required.Related

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“It is important to keep making those points, but not by sitting down for 45 minutes and having those types of talk,” he said. “It’s just real quick and repetitive, but the conversations haven’t changed at all. It’s very clear in the way me and Brendon talk to the team, and especially the first day here, it was pretty obvious that the lads are still very much on that path. It makes the new lads feel at ease when the conversations are still as clear as they were six months ago. Especially Will Jacks and Liam Livingstone, that’s the way they want to play their cricket. It’s great having guys like that in the squad. It’s great to watch.”There is a palpable sense of excitement about the visit to Pakistan, even if they’d prefer a little more freedom. Some players are looking to take cues from Australia’s successful tour to the country earlier this year, among them opener Zak Crawley who spoke in the week about watching the series back and noting how well openers on both sides performed. Others, like Stokes, are wary of putting too much stock in thinking conditions will be identical.”We are not reading too much into the Australia-Pakistan series, because we don’t know it’ll be like that,” he said. “If we get there and it looks dry, it might spin. We have heard some comms that it might be green, nippy wickets. We need all bases covered, and to wait and see.”Whatever is laid out in front of them, he believes his England squad has shown over the summer just how malleable they can be.”As the summer went on, we learnt to adapt to different situations,” he added. “First and foremost, we have in the front of our mind the conversations we have had and the way we want to play our cricket. What we will go to Pakistan with is that mindset of knowing we will need to absorb pressure but if, at any given time, we feel the time is right to pounce and put pressure on the opposition, we will still do that. It’s obviously going to be different conditions and situations, but first and foremost the way we play, the team ethos, how we play with the bat and attack with the ball won’t change. As time progresses we will see adaptation of that.”Best of all, this trip, along with the seven-match T20I tour in September and October, will go some way to earning back trust after England’s no-show of 2021. There were fears of a similar about-turn at the start of the month when Imran Khan was wounded in the leg after being shot during a protest march in Wazirabad. But minds are at ease thanks to feedback since the incident, and the scale of what England are about to embark on – a first Test tour of Pakistan since 2005 – is not lost on the team or its captain.”It’s been a long time since England have played Test cricket in Pakistan,” Stokes said. “With what happened with Imran Khan recently, there was a little bit of concern, but we have Reg Dickason, who has been the security man for many years with England, and we left it in his capable hands. He went out and said everything could continue as planned. Having that man feed you that information back puts everyone’s mind at ease – players and support staff.”In terms of the tour itself, I’m really looking forward to it,” Stokes added. “I’ve never been there, and I’m quite interested to see what the security lark is like. I’ve heard it’s pretty intense. With the cricket, I’m really looking forward to it. We know what the subcontinent feels about the cricket, it’s a huge part of their life, and we’re looking forward to going out there.”