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[cricket_news]

Gayle to lead strong Windies team
2 November 2009, 10:12 pm



Gayle to lead strong Windies team



Gayle has only played club cricket in recent weeks

Chris Gayle will return as captain as West Indies name a full-strength squad for the upcoming tour of Australia.Only four players remain from the last two tournaments, after a money dispute lead to the naming of a shadow squad.

However, 19-year-old Adrian Barath, one of two players without Test experience, is set to open the batting with Gayle.

Dwayne Bravo, Jerome Taylor and Australia-born Brendan Nash return to the squad, but Fidel Edwards misses out due to a knee injury.

For Nash, who was brought up in Western Australia, the tour will represent a first return as a player since choosing to represent the West Indies.

The return of key players should help settle a West Indies side that suffered heavy defeats both in the series with Bangladesh and subsequent Champions Trophy.

Shivnarine Chanerpaul and Ramnaresh Sarwan return to bolster the batting line-up. However, much of the attention will focus on Barath, who hit a century in a warm-up game on England's last tour and averages 46 in first-class matches.

Fast bowler Gavin Tonge, 26, is the other uncapped player, while Darren Sammy, batsman Travis Dowlin and bowler Kemar Roach are the other players to retain a place following the Champions Trophy.

Former fast bowler Joel Garner will be team manager.

West Indies will play Queensland in a four-day game starting on 18 November, their only warm-up fixture before the opening Test in Brisbane.

The dispute over players' contracts and image rights forced West Indies to field a weakened team, captained by Floyd Reifer, in a home series against Bangladesh and the ICC Champions Trophy.



606: DEBATE

A welcome move by the WICB after a shambolic standoff between them and the players

sportbloggeradi

During that period, the only major match won by the team was a Twenty20 international against Bangladesh in St Kitts.

And the onus will be on Gayle and his players to restore the reputation of Caribbean cricket.

But West Indies have not won a series in Australia since 1992/3 and the odds will be heavily against them doing so this time as most of their players have not played international cricket since July.

Gayle himself recently made headlines for being bowled by world and Olympic sprint champion Usain Bolt during a charity match.

West Indies touring squad:

Chris Gayle (Captain), Adrian Barath, Sulieman Benn, Dwayne Bravo, Shiv Chanderpaul, Narsingh Deonarine, Travis Dowlin, Brendan Nash, Denesh Ramdin, Ravi Rampaul, Kemar Roach, 12 Darren Sammy, 13 Ramnaresh Sarwan, Jerome Taylor, Gavin Tonge



Source: BBC Sport | Cricket | World Edition