ST, JOHN’S, An­tigua – In an ex­clu­sive in­ter­view with Crick­et West In­dies’ Nicholas Mait­land, West In­dies Acad­e­my’s ris­ing star Car­lon Bowen-Tuck­ett opened up about his crick­et jour­ney, his guid­ing prin­ci­ples, and the sig­nif­i­cance of faith and fam­i­ly in his life.

The young wick­et­keep­er-bats­man re­cent­ly achieved a ma­jor mile­stone, scor­ing his maid­en first-class cen­tu­ry against Bar­ba­dos Pride, a mo­ment that marked a turn­ing point in his bur­geon­ing ca­reer.

Bowen-Tuck­ett be­gan the third day of the match on 71 not out, sens­ing some­thing spe­cial was on the hori­zon. How­ev­er, as he edged clos­er to the cen­tu­ry mark, the weight of the oc­ca­sion be­gan to take its toll.

“When I hit 90, that’s when the nerves and emo­tions start­ed kick­ing in. I was a lit­tle guilty of look­ing too far ahead and not play­ing each ball with the care it de­served.”

De­spite the mount­ing pres­sure, the 20-year-old held his nerve to reach the cov­et­ed three-fig­ure mark in Bar­ba­dos, a place of deep per­son­al sig­nif­i­cance. Though raised in Nevis, Bowen-Tuck­ett was born in Bar­ba­dos, where his ma­ter­nal grand­fa­ther, Egerton Bowen, served as a pas­tor. It is this strong re­li­gious foun­da­tion that con­tin­ues to shape his ap­proach to crick­et and life.

“My faith al­lows me to stay calm be­cause I know I have the back­ing of God. I’ve learned that God al­ways has a plan for me. Even when I face dif­fi­cul­ties, whether it’s not scor­ing the runs I want or not keep­ing wick­et as well as I’d like, I know He won’t leave me alone. He has big­ger and bet­ter plans for me.”

This sense of calm has proven in­valu­able in his dual role as a wick­et­keep­er-bats­man, a po­si­tion that de­mands tech­ni­cal skill, men­tal re­silience, and phys­i­cal fit­ness. Bowen-Tuck­ett em­pha­sized the im­por­tance of bal­anc­ing both as­pects of his game.

“Both roles are equal­ly im­por­tant. Some say bat­ting is more cru­cial in mod­ern crick­et, but they go hand in hand. If you don’t keep wick­et well, it hin­ders the team, and if you don’t bat well, it does the same.”

To main­tain this bal­ance, Bowen-Tuck­ett adopts a sys­tem­at­ic ap­proach to train­ing. “I try to give equal at­ten­tion to both bat­ting and wick­et­keep­ing. If I feel strong in one area but ne­glect­ed the oth­er, I ad­just my fo­cus ac­cord­ing­ly.”

Bowen-Tuck­ett draws in­spi­ra­tion from his god­fa­ther, for­mer West In­dies wick­et­keep­er Ri­d­ley Ja­cobs, and New Zealand’s Kane Williamson.

“My game is sim­i­lar to Williamson’s, as I take my time and bat a lot of balls. In this Acad­e­my team, we have play­ers who score quick­ly, so I’ve em­braced my role of ab­sorb­ing pres­sure and build­ing an in­nings.”

Look­ing ahead, the young crick­eter re­mains ground­ed and fo­cused on the present. “If I do my work and per­form on the field, the fu­ture will take care of it­self. My goal is to con­tribute to the team in every game.”

For as­pir­ing crick­eters, Bowen-Tuck­ett of­fers sim­ple yet pro­found ad­vice: “En­joy the process and the game. At a young age, don’t put un­nec­es­sary pres­sure on your­self. Em­brace the hard work and en­joy your ca­reer.”

CMC