Gomes and Adams belonged to different eras

Sa'adi Thawfeeq

CRICKET - Their international cricket careers had a gap of five years, but both sported the West Indies cap proudly. Presently they are on opposite camps trying to help the respective countries they are in charge to try and win the ICC under 19 World Cup which is currently taking place in Colombo.

Larry Gomes belongs to the era when West Indies cricket was at its zenith. His career ran from 1976 to 1987 during which period he appeared in 60 Tests and 83 one-day internationals. Today he is in charge of the United States of America (USA) cricket team.

Gomes was proud the way his prot,g,s fared against the powerful West Indians yesterday and said: "I am pleased about their performance today. It was a good experience for them. They showed a bit of character when they batted and put on a reasonable show. It would have been nicer if they had won."

"We are in a tough group with Australia, South Africa, and West Indies. I hope the experience they gain playing against these sides will hold them in good stead. They are the future players of USA. Hopefully they will become better players," said Gomes.

At one stage of the match USA looked like causing an upset when they were 150-3 after 25 overs chasing West Indies' total of 302.

"It wasn't easy. It was a tough task asking them to score over 300 considering this is the first time they are playing in an under 19 World Cup. Although we were well placed at one stage it was a tough ask getting to those extra 150 runs," said Gomes.

USA also began the match well capturing two early West Indies wickets for eight runs. But according to Gomes they failed to capitalize on it.

"It was an excellent knock by Perkins. A couple of the guys played well to give West Indies a big total," he said.

Gomes who is contracted as coach to USA only for this tournament said that it was unfortunate that he didn't have enough time on his hands to work with the boys.

"I undertook the job last July a day before the qualifying tournament in Toronto.We won all four matches to qualify to play in the World Cup. It is unfortunate that I didn't have much longer to work with these boys," said Gomes. "I had less than a week before we came over here. I couldn't get to work on them individually as I would have liked. It is a learning experience for the guys and I hope they leave here better players."

Gomes said that he was open to offers after this tournament and that he had applied for a job in Canada who has qualified to play in next year's World Cup in the Caribbean.

Gomes is best remembered in Sri Lanka for having his nose and mouth gashed by a rearing delivery from former Sri Lanka fast bowler Rumesh Ratnayake in a one-day tournament in Australia two decades ago.

Gomes said West Indies cricket today was short of bowlers. "If you don't have bowlers to bowl out teams and take 20 wickets in a Test match you wouldn't win matches. We don't seem to be having anyone at the moment."

Adams on the falling standards of Windies cricket

Adams who played for West Indies in the period when they were on the decline said the root cause of the problem lay with the falling standard of cricket in the Caribbean in the past 20 years.

"Our first class cricket is not what it was and it is not what it should be. I am hoping for a return to higher standards than at the present. It will take time, it will take all the resources and most importantly it will take our willingness from those in charge of our cricket to appreciate how our standards have fallen," said Adams who played for his country between 1992 and 2001 and also captained the national team.

"Without improved standards the Test team will reflect basically the standards that exist in the Caribbean. The solution will involve a lot of time, quite a bit of resources and also a bit of planning as well," he said.

Adams said that in his opinion West Indies were never short of raw material at under 19 levels. "All the under 19 tournaments I have seen or in the recent past confirms that we had raw material.

Maybe we are not pulling it through as we should have from this stage onwards. That might be a possibility," said Adams.

"We keep hoping for better international results. That is not something we can worry about at this level. We have to do a good job here as best we can and hope that these young men can move on to become very good international cricketers sooner rather than later," continued Adams.

"Upto this level we can compete on talent alone. It's going to take a little bit more than talent from here on. This is where in a lot of areas after this level that standard has fallen appreciably in the last 20 years. We need to lift those standards," he said.

Adams said that his team was conscious of the large amount of wides his bowlers were conceding.

"We had this problem before coming here. We went to Pakistan for a couple of weeks and we experienced the same problem. These young men are having a bit of a problem controlling the white ball. We are looking to find a solution to this problem. We had already tried to arrest it in specific ways.

It is proving to be very costly," said Adams.

He undertook the job of being manager of the West Indies under 19 side because of the late withdrawal of Roger Harper who undertook a post in Kenya.

"I am involved in two projects in the UK which keeps me very busy. I had this winter off so I was available," he said.

After ending a career of 54 Tests and 127 ODIs Adams played some cricket in England and South Africa for a few years. He also coached in South Africa and Zimbabwe recently and this is the first time he has been involved with a West Indies national cricket team.