Bin it and move on, Pollard tells 'demolished' Windies

AFP

West Indies captain Kieron Pollard has a simple advice for his team after being "demolished" by England in their Twenty20 World Cup opener - forget the thrashing and revive the title defence.

The repeat of the 2016 final proved a one-sided affair with West Indies wilting for an embarrassing 55 inside 15 overs, and England romping home inside nine overs.

Pollard called the batting capitulation "unacceptable" and expected better in their coming Group I outings.

"It's disappointing to start a tournament like that, being the defending champions," the 34-year-old told reporters.

"Having said that, it's something that we just need to accept. We accept it. We take full responsibility for what transpired out there and for us, games like these, you try to bin it as quickly as possible and move on."

England's spin duo of Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali shared six wickets between them and Chris Gayle's 13 was the only double digit score in West Indies' sorry-looking scorecard.

"For us, we just need to go back, sort of look at our performances, look at the way we have gotten out and see if we can find maybe a medium as to how we need to approach it," Pollard said.

The key was to put the setback behind and prepare for the next Group 1 match against South Africa on Tuesday.

"I think for us, it's very, very important that a game like this you sort of forget," the all-rounder said.

"You try to dig too much into it. Then you might unearth some things that you don't really want to. For us, it's pretty simple: accept and move on."

West Indies left out Roston Chase, who was expected to play the middle-order anchor role, while the move to promote Dwayne Bravo did not work either.

"Roston has got the opportunity to be selected in the squad, but we thought that this was the best XI to go out and try to win the first game for us," Pollard explained.

"We lost a couple of wickets early on and expected the guys to bat a couple of overs, just knock it around and see if we could set it up for the back end but we kept losing wickets.

"Bravo went up to break the trend of the left-handers, just to knock it around a bit more. It didn't work today and these things happen." 

More from Sports News

  • Arsenal miss chance to go six points clear with draw at Brentford

    Arsenal has wasted the chance to restore their six-point lead at the top of the Premier League table as they were held to a 1-1 draw at Brentford on Thursday, with Noni Madueke's second-half header cancelled out by Keane Lewis-Potter.

  • India thump Namibia ahead of Pakistan clash

    Defending champions India continued their march towards the Super Eight stage of the Twenty20 World Cup with a 93-run win over Namibia in a group A contest at Arun Jaitley Stadium on Thursday.

  • Italy crush Nepal in maiden T20 World Cup victory

    Brothers Justin and Anthony Mosca guided Twenty20 World Cup debutants Italy to their first win in the tournament, as their unbeaten half-centuries secured a dominant 10-wicket victory over Nepal in a Group C clash on Thursday.

  • Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships reveals major expansion plan

    The 2026 Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships will usher in the start of a new era for one of the Middle East’s most iconic sporting events with plans revealed for an extensive two-phase redevelopment that will transform the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium and surrounding Aviation Club Tennis Complex.

Blogs