New white ball captain Nicholas Buran will be without Jason Holder, Shimron Hetmer and Evin Lewis during the West Indies ODI rounds of Holland and Pakistan from May 31. Instead, Jayden Sells, Shermon Lewis and Specialist Casey Carty have been included as new faces in the 15-member squad that will play the six games that make up part of the ODI Premier League.
While Hetmyer has been given a break so he can go home for the birth of his first child, the statement from Cricket West Indies said that even Lewis was not considered because he failed the CWI’s physical fitness standards. Holder was relieved, citing workload management as the main reason. All three are part of an ongoing IPL season although Hetmyer has since left the championship bubble to be with his family.
Fast bowlers Sells and Shermon Lewis have been selected to join the ODIs for the first time. The other new face, Carty, is 25 years old and averages 25.05 in List-A cricket after 23 matches. In March, he scored 57 and 49 against the England Test team in a warm-up match representing the CWI chief’s eleventh. His selection also makes history as he is the first Saint Martin player to receive a phone call from the West Indies.
“We’ve been impressed by Karty and the way he’s been going in his roles, and we’ve seen several glimpses of his ability in the way he played against England earlier this year in the CWI President’s 11th team,” chief selector Desmond Hines said in the statement. “We hope to give him this opportunity to realize the importance of representing the West Indies. We think he is a young batsman with great promise, and this is the kind of tour he can show he fits in.
“We also have a very good group of young bowlers who have shown their potential and we want to use these two rounds to give them chances in over 50 form. We have a week in Holland and another week in Pakistan and that should provide them with good opposition to the ball as we build towards the Cricket World Cup in 2023. Philip has been around for quite some time and we know what he can deliver, Sells has been very good at Test cricket and Lewis is back in the West Indies setup after some good performances.”
The West Indies are not currently among the sites eligible to qualify directly for the ODI World Cup in India next year. They are tenth in the Premier League points table, having lost each of their most recent three ODI series, including an unexpected 2-1 defeat to Ireland at home.
After this round, the West Indies will have only three matches left in the Premier League – a postponed home series against New Zealand. If they fail to achieve direct qualification, they will have to enter the competition via a qualifying tournament, which is the path the team used to reach the 2019 World Cup in England.
Whole band: Nicholas Buran (Captain), Shay Hope (Vice Captain), Nkrumah Bonner, Shamara Brooks, Casey Carty, Akeel Hussain, Zari Joseph, Brandon King, Shermon Lewis, Kyle Myers, Anderson Philip, Rofman Powell, Jayden Sells, Romario Shepherd, Hayden Walsh Jr.
