Will WI pip SA out of tournament..... something on Ottis Gibson, the coach

When you perform well; the whole World recognizes you and you rise to the top……………

With the semifinal slot up for grabs, South Africa and the West Indies would be locked in what is a virtual quarterfinal when they take on each other in their last Group B match. The WI Squad reads : Dwayne Bravo (c); Chris Gayle; Jason Holder; Sunil Naraine; Kieron Pollard; Ravi Rampaul; Darren Sammy, Marlon Samuels; Tino Best; Darren Bravo; Johnson Charles;  Denesh Ramdin (vc & wk);  Kemar Roach; Ramnaresh Sarwan and Devon Smith.  If you get a feeling that there are too many familiar names…. You are not alone ~ most of them were here in IPL 6

Whether Dale Steyn [another IPL star] bowls and wipes Windies away or will Chris Gayle factor tilt the scales in the West Indies' favour would be interesting to watch. The West Indian batting features quite a few aggressors apart from Gayle. Kieron Pollard is yet to come good here.  Sunil Naraine could prove to be a tricky customer.

Ahead of the earlier match, which WI lost to India [Shikhar Dhawan added another century and Jadeja took 5]; the WI coach was quoted as stating that West Indies team management was banking on quality feedback from its Indian Premier League stars.  The coach said the IPL stars are expected to provide "intelligence" on the Indian players in their team meeting as he admitted that the Twenty20 league inputs will play a crucial factor for the calypso charmers. "Well, that's one of the key things, I think. Everybody has got video of each other now. We watch so much footage of each other, but we also have a lot of our players mixing with the Indian players in the IPL,"  he told reporters at the pre-match press conference on Monday.

The coach ruled out chin music against the Indians. The former pacer from Barbados, who has been England's bowling coach, admitted the current squad did not have the class and caliber of the pacemen of the Eighties. "The last time we used short-pitch bowling, it was Joel Garner, Colin Croft, Michael Holding and people like that. We don't have those guys, those tall guys anymore, so as we saw against Pakistan, we pitched it up, we swung it a little bit and we put it in the right areas, and I suppose that will be the strategy going forward," he said.

The 44-year-old West Indian is well versed with English conditions. He signed up for Glamorgan in 2006 but next season, he played for Durham and took 10 wickets in an innings against Hampshire in July 2007 ~ and immediately after that was appointed bowling coach of England. 

That is Ottis Gibson for you.  Ottis Delroy Gibson hails from Barbados. Gibson made two Test appearances for the West Indies. In his first outing against England in 1995, he picked up the wickets of Alec Stewart and Darren Gough in the first innings, finishing with figures of 2-81, but was less successful in the second with 0-51. With the bat he made 29 and 14, as the West Indies slumped to a 72 run defeat. His next was to come years later in 1999 against South Africa.  He was considered a ODI specialist – yet played only 15 making a best score of 52 and 5-42 against Sri Lanka. He took another 5 wicket haul against the same opposition and two four-fors, finishing with an impressive bowling average of 18.26.

His moment of glory came when he clean swept Hampshire in July 2007.   38 at that time, the Barbadian cut down his pace and relied more on swing than seam on a pitch which had sweated under covers to finish with figures of 17.3-1-47-10 as Hampshire were dismissed for 115. Gibson had five for 31 from 12 overs at lunch and eight for 47 from 17 overs when rain brought a 90-minute break. He admitted: "It couldn't have worked out better for me, because both times I started to feel tired I got a break.

Later in 2007, Gibson bowled Durham to victory, again against Hampshire, in the Friends Provident Trophy. After setting 312 to win, with Gibson smashing fifteen off just seven balls, the Dynamos bowled out the Hawks for just 187.  Then in Sept. 2007,  Gibson was appointed as England's bowling coach for the one-day series in Sri Lanka because Allan Donald had commentary duties in South Africa

In January 2010 it was announced that Gibson would be leaving his England post  and he is presently the coach of West Indies. He bowled well, took all the 10 wickets in an innings, then played less – becoming a Coach

With regards – S. Sampathkumar

Photo courtesy : IBNlive.