Chevrons have to up their skill: Sammons

IT wasn’t a rosy start for Justin Sammons in his new role as the head coach of the Zimbabwe men’s national cricket team after watching his side receive a 4-1 hammering at the hands of a youthful India side in a five-match T20I series that concluded on Sunday at Harare Sports Club.

The series against India was Sammons’ first as the head coach of the Chevrons and believes that there is a lot of work that still needs to be done if the team is to improve. Zimbabwe won the first game of the series before going on to lose the other four matches much to the disappointment of the new gaffer.

Speaking on Saturday following his side’s 10-wicket loss in the fourth match, the South African believes that in terms of skill, his side is not yet where they need to be. However, the gaffer had not gotten enough time to do proper assessment of his players having only arrived a week before the commencement of the series. For him, the Indian series was an eye-opener.

“I wouldn’t call it a weakness, I would call it an area where we can look to improve. It’s the skill, the level of skill with the ball, with the bat, in the field, probably it’s just been slackening. But, there is no better test than playing the best in the world.”That shows where you are, from a skill level point of view. We have to up our skills, there is no doubt about that. I have only been here a week and five days, so it’s not a long time.

So, I am slowly getting to understand the skillsets that each individual possesses and how sort of identity and character is the team. We are slowly starting to put that together as a T20 team,” said Sammons. He added: “International cricket is ruthless, there is no place to hide.” The Chevron’s fielding throughout the series left a lot to be desired. They were poor in the field and that is one grey area that the team’s captain, Sikandar Raza highlighted after the game on Sunday. He, however, still has faith in his team.

“I am a guy who always looks at the positives, there has been a lot of positives, but I cannot keep my eyes closed on the things that we really have to work on. I think it’s important to address the fact that we have made a lot of mistakes in the field that allowed the opposition to come into the game again and again.

“But, if somebody asks me if I have changed my mind about this team, no. We have all the right ingredients to be a mid-table team very soon, yes, the team needs a bit of love, care, nursing, sometimes with a bit of beating and some harsh words at times, but I think we will get there, we may not have a lot of time because I have seen the fixtures for the Qualifiers that are out soon. We have to really pull up our socks.

“There’s a lot of positives, I know when you lose a series it’s all doom and gloom and people tend to focus on negatives more than the positives but with me, it’s the other way round, there’s a lot of positives, a lot of good signs to work with,” said Raza. Zimbabwe stunned the world champions in the opening game of the series, winning a low-scoring match by 13 runs. The visitors would go on to level the series with a massive 100-run victory in the second encounter. In the third match, India took the lead following their 23-run win.

Their dominance continued into the fourth match, which they convincingly won by 10 wickets before going on to round it up with a 42-run win on Sunday afternoon. With the 4-1 defeat at the hands of India, Zimbabwe’s record in the shortest version of the game in the past six months hasn’t been a good one. They have now played 16 T20I matches since December last year and have lost 12 of them, winning four only.

Following the completion of the series, Sammons and his men have less than two weeks to prepare for a one-off Test against Ireland, which is scheduled for 25-29 July at Stormont in Belfast, Ireland. —@brandon_malvin