Windies want to press on their advantage

WEST INDIES opener Kieran Powell believes it is “definitely advantage Windies” after they ended the third day with a lead of 48 runs in Bulawayo.

“If we could stretch this to a 100-150 run lead, that would be massive,” Powell said. “We’re only 48 runs ahead now, but we’ve put lots of miles on their legs.

‘‘We’re going to come back tomorrow with two set guys as well, put some more miles on their legs and stretch out that lead as much as possible.

‘‘Any lead is a good lead on this pitch. Tomorrow we don’t know if the pitch is going to start going up and down, so we’ve got to get as big a lead as possible that will help us push for a result.”

Powell played a significant role in pushing West Indies ahead. With Kraigg Brathwaite for company, he ground Zimbabwe down on Monday afternoon before upping the tempo on day three.

“It was just the flow of the day’s play,” Powell said.

“Obviously, yesterday they bowled a bit tighter, and they bowled better lines. Today they gave us more scoring opportunities, and as the day progressed we had guys lower down the order to push the score along as well.”

“I still like to think that I’m a batter who can bowl, but being an allrounder it becomes a responsibility that you need to step up whenever you are given an opportunity. We are spending a lot more time as a spinning unit working on our bowling compared to six months ago, so to see the rewards like this is certainly humbling.”

Sikanda Raza finished the day with 5 for 82 from 43 overs.

He might easily have had a sixth wicket when he trapped Jason Holder in front of the stumps when he had scored just 11, but umpire Kumar Dharmasena disagreed with the appeal and Zimbabwe had already used up all of their reviews.

Indeed, it was Raza who had used their last review attempting to dislodge Kieran Powell.

“It is what it is,” Raza said. “I said to the captain that I think I deserved it because we went for a review on Powell when we shouldn’t have. Kumar said he heard an inside edge. We didn’t. But a few go your way and a few don’t. The (Roston) Chase decision could have gone either way. You win some you lose some.”

Holder went on to strike an unbeaten 71, putting on 144 for the eighth wicket with Shane Dowrich and extending West Indies lead to 48 at the close.

“We wanted to be 48 ahead,” Raza said.

“If the decision against Holder had gone our way then that could have happened. But we tried everything, we bowled well, we fielded well, our energies were up. Sometimes you’re going to have to raise your hand and say that we tried everything and it didn’t work because the opposition have batted well. Credit to them for batting that well.”

A natural optimist, Raza reminded the press corp that Zimbabwe were just a few overs away from the new ball on Wednesday morning.

Only half joking, he also said he would be willing to open the bowling in West Indies’ second innings. - Cricinfo.