Confident of doing well on home turf in the longer format of the game, West Indies skipper Jason Holder said that his team was raring to go against India in the first of the two Test matches beginning August 22 in Antigua.
“I think the mindset in the team is positive. The guys are upbeat for the challenge. We have played good Test cricket for the past couple of years, we have been able to put up some series wins. The guys know what is at stake, and it is just a matter of doing small things right,” Holder told reporters ahead of the first Test match.
“If we want to beat the top teams, we need to be up for the challenge. I am personally looking towards the challenge of playing against Virat, Ashwin. I think from a team perspective, we get the best out of ourselves when we play against the best, we tend to go hard at them,” he added.
Former cricketers Brian Lara and Ramnaresh Sarwan were called in by the West Indies team to help them out in the build-up to the series. Holder said that the duo has been helpful in providing aid to the side.
“Brian brings a lot of stature in terms of his career, of what he has achieved. In terms of the mental aspect, it was a situation where he came in and broke it down really nicely for us. Sarwan has been awesome in the dressing room, he was a bit more of a tactician,” Holder said.
When asked about the batting unit, Holder replied that the batting lineup can come good collectively a bit more often, adding the batters can improve.
“I do not think we need to do something different from what we have been doing. Our success has come from being patient. As a bowling unit, we have shown good performances. When I talk about batting, I still believe we have not collectively performed well. We need to improve and hope for better performances,” Holder said.
