ST. JOHN’S, Antigua – Cricket West Indies (CWI) today announced the appointment of Robert Samuels as the Interim Head Coach for the West Indies Women’s team for the upcoming CG United One Day International (ODI) Series and West Indies T20 International (T20I) series against Ireland in St. Lucia.
Samuels, a former Jamaica captain, and West Indies batsman, played six Test matches and eight ODIs in addition to 106 first-class matches and 77 List A matches. His most recent role was as an Assistant Coach with the West Indies Women team.
Speaking on Samuels’ appointment, CWI’s High Performance Manager Graeme West said: “Robert brings continuity and stability to get the team through this period. He has great knowledge of the players and the women’s game in general and strong knowledge of the support staff, so it’s almost a seamless transition with Robert coming in as Interim Head Coach. He has his own ideas and is trying to implement them now as Interim Head Coach as opposed to assistant coach. He has made a good impact and start over the last few days and I’m sure it will continue throughout the series.”
The Interim Assistant Coaches are former West Indies spin bowler, Ryan Austin and Steve Liburd, the former Leeward Islands batsman and captain. Liburd is the Head Coach of the West Indies Women’s U19 Rising Stars.
The West Indies 18-member squad is presently at a training camp at the Daren Sammy Cricket Ground in St. Lucia where they are preparing to face Ireland Women in the three-match CG United ODI Series which starts on Monday, June 26. This will be followed by the three-match T20I Series from July 4 to 8.
The matches are West Indies Women’s only home fixture in 2023. The three CG United ODIs comprise West Indies’ third fixture in the ICC Women’s Championship where they are pushing to win points to achieve a top-five position to qualify automatically for the ICC 2025 Women’s Cricket World Cup.
Match tickets are available online from the Windies Tickets service, presented by Mastercard-Tickets.windiescricket.com – at a discounted price of US$6/EC$16 (USS3/EC$7.50 children and seniors) compared to the match day box office price of US$7.50/EC$20 (US$3.75/EC$10 for children and seniors).
The caribbean is fast becoming too American now. Back in the sixties and seventies and then the eighties when the West Indies dominated world cricket, we never heard of coaches dominating world cricket and our boys did superbly well on and off the field. They showcased both their batting and bowling skills in the absence of all these so-called coaches trying be Americans. I personally believe that this is what that has killed cricket in the West Indies. You cannot tell someone how to bat if that is his style of batting or how to bowl if that is his style of bowling. There is a coach for batting, one for fielding, one for bowling, one for catching the ball, one for running between wickets, one for wiping his sweaty face if it is too hot out there. Can we have a coach also for rolling the refreshment car onto the field as well as one for controlling the crowd on the stands? It all sounds ridiculous. Time to go back to our culture and stop wanting to do as America says.