West Indies vs England: Hosts race to victory in first ODI
With England’s Test tour of Pakistan only finishing on Saturday, it meant a number of key players were not considered for this Caribbean tour, comprising three ODIs and five T20s.
Harry Brook, Brydon Carse and Gus Atkinson are among the players skipping this series before the pre-Christmas Test tour of New Zealand.
Meanwhile regular captain Jos Buttler was forced to miss out with a calf injury, while veterans such as Jonny Bairstow, Joe Root, Ben Stokes, Chris Woakes and Mark Wood have not featured since last autumn’s World Cup.
It meant England fielded an inexperienced line-up in Antigua, including four debutants in Turner, Cox, and all-rounders Dan Mousley and Jamie Overton.
Indeed spinner Adil Rashid outnumbered the caps of the rest of the line-up put together, with 140 to 127.
Furthermore, some of England’s debutants lacked experience of 50-over cricket, with Cox and Mousley playing their first List A games in 20 months and three years respectively.
It has arguably left them unprepared for the challenges of the longer white-ball format, with former England captain Sir Alastair Cook noting on TNT Sports “there’s no experience of working out different situations, for when you’re thrown into international cricket under increased scrutiny”.
Even those with greater experience, such as the 30-year-old Overton, looked rusty, as the Surrey player was dismissed lbw for a first-ball duck by Motie.
With so many absentees and numerous debutants jammed between Test tours, the series has the air of an afterthought.
But this is the ninth of only 14 ODIs scheduled between the World Cup and February’s Champions Trophy – England must emerge from the series with valuable experience or they could face another embarrassing international tournament exit.
