Moore DERBY, England (CMC):
West Indies coach David Moore blasted the team's inept batting performance Sunday that led to their heavy loss to Derbyshire in their Twenty/20 warm-up match at County Ground.
Tuning up to face England in two official Twenty/20 fixtures later this week, West Indies plunged to a 51-run defeat when they were bowled out for just 84 runs in 15.4 overs.
"It is very disap-pointing. We committed the cardinal sin to not bat our 20 overs out," Moore said after the game. "We lost six wickets in four overs, played poor shots, it was very poor batting."
Moore conceded that the players are inexperienced in Twenty/20 cricket but he sug-gested at the same time that applying a logical approach to the task was missing from the play on Sunday.
"I think they haven't played enough of it, particularly at the international level as a team. This is only our second 20/20 as a West Indies team so we are coming to grips with it (but) basic cricket knowledge and understanding applies and they should have applied that this afternoon," Moore said.
Derbyshire compiled 135 for six off their 20 overs and then reduced the touring side to a flimsy 84 all out with more than four overs to spare. Antiguan newcomer Austin Richards hit a top-score of 25, with three fours and a six in his innings that lasted 33 balls but the West Indies tumbled from 67 for four to their final total, losing their last six wickets for a mere 17 runs.
Asked if the West Indies players needed to learn new skills to be effective in the Twenty/20 format, the Australian Moore suggested there is hardly anything different in the ultra-abbreviated game that players will not encounter at various points in the longer game.
"I don't think it is necessarily about learning new skills. It's about applying your knowledge; there were many opportunities for singles. There were too many attempted big hits rather than nudging the ball for singles and then cash in on the bad balls. Wetried to make too many things out of reasonable balls and played too many poor shots," said Moore
Ahead of their two-match Twenty/20 series against England Thursday and Friday, West Indies will play their last Twenty/20 warm-up match against a PCA Masters XI today
