Former West Indies fast bowlers Michael Holding and Ian Bishop say Darren Bravo and Shimron Hetmyer\u2019s decision to not travel to England for the three-Test series due to safety concerns arising out of the COVID-19 pandemic should be respected though the team will miss \u201cthem\u201d.<\/p>\n
Besides Bravo and Hetmyer, Keemo Paul also refused to travel to the UK for the Wisden Trophy starting July 8.\u00a0 \u201cI think it\u2019s unfortunate as far as West Indies cricket is concerned. I\u2019m not going to tell anyone that they should be going to England because COVID-19 is around, someone may get sick or even worse.\u00a0 \u201cBut at the same time I think it\u2019s unfortunate for the West Indies team because these guys have quite a bit of talent, and they\u2019ll be missed,\u201d Holding said on his Youtube channel.<\/p>\n
Holding said England series would have been a good chance for Bravo to revive his career after being dropped for the Afghanistan Test in November. \u201cI\u2019m sorry that Bravo in particular isn\u2019t going because Bravo, I think, needs to resuscitate his career. He started off so brilliantly, everybody thought he was going to be another great West Indian batsman.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe hasn\u2019t really fulfilled that. I think the more cricket he can play now, especially for West Indies, the better chance he has of getting back on track and showing everyone the great player that he could be.\u201d On the highly rated Hetmyer, Holding added: \u201cHetmyer, again, I think he\u2019s a very, very talented player. I think people have heard me talk about him in the past. Again, I\u2019m sorry that he\u2019s not going so that he can get more opportunity to express himself. But I ain\u2019t blaming them for not going.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bishop echoed Holding\u2019s sentiments, saying players must get an option during a health crisis situation. \u201cYou have to give players the option because it\u2019s a world health crisis,\u201d Bishop told the Trinidad Express.\u00a0 \u201cIf a player decides he does not want to take that health risk, you can\u2019t hold it against him in this context. The players know they are taking a risk if someone who replaced them goes on to have great success. That\u2019s a chance you take,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The Test series, to be played in a bio-secure environment to counter the COVID-19 threat, is subject to the final approval of the UK government. The contest will also mark the return of international cricket which was suspended in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.<\/p>\n
The first Test will be held from July 8-12 at the Aegeas Bowl while the remaining two at Old Trafford (July 16-20 and July 24-28). The West Indies squad will arrive in the UK on June 9 and will travel to Old Trafford for quarantining and training. The venue will be their base for three weeks before they move to the Ageas Bowl for the start of the first Test.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Test series, to be played in a bio-secure environment to counter the COVID-19 threat, is subject to the final approval of the UK government. The contest will also mark the return of international cricket which was suspended in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":23680,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cricket"],"reading_time":"3 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}