With all the big hitters within the team, the West Indies team is not settling down and this is their major problem at the moment, says West Indies great Clive Lloyd.
The Guyanese-born Lloyd, who took the West Indies to the first two ICC World Cup titles and the final in the third event, says the West Indies players are not making big enough scores at this tournament and this is being clearly shown by the fact that they have only one win in six matches.
The West Indies next go into action on Thursday, when they battle the mighty Indians at Manchester. If they win their last three matches and other results go in their favour, the West Indies can still sneak into the semis. However, from the way the team has played so far, this seems a long shot at best.
Looking at the composition of the team, Lloyd said stability, especially in the middle order, was clearly one of the major issues.
"West Indies need that stability at the moment, as they are going after the bowling but not realising that they need to be stable in the middle of their innings,” he said.
"West Indies have a lot of good strikers of the ball but they don’t have a player like Larry Gomes to stick around or Roston Chase who can also do that job.
“Shai Hope is the type of player they need to produce more of. If he hadn’t made the 96 against Bangladesh, the West Indies wouldn’t have made runs. For all the criticism over his strike rate, if someone had stuck around with him against Bangladesh, Jason Holder’s side would have made 360 or above."
The T&T-born Gomes played with the great West Indies teams of the late 1970s into the early 80s and earned the nickname Mr Dependable because he played long innings and often held the inning together if his other more flashy teammates failed.
Lloyd said he believed there are some current players who can play these types of innings but the approach was what was lacking.
"We have the talent, it’s just a case of pushing on and batting long,” Lloyd, who is currently in England doing commentary on the World Cup, said.
“In that regard, they need to look at the example set by Kane Williamson. The New Zealand captain didn’t break a sweat at all and just knocked it around on his way to a match-winning 148. There hasn’t been much balance in the choosing of the squad in this competition either."