"I love his energy" - Windies skipper Jason Holder praises his teammate

Windies skipper Jason Holder lavished praise on Sheldon Cottrell after the pacer’s starring display in the second ODI against England on Friday in Antigua. When Windies ended their innings on 289 for 6, it looked all over for them. With the world number one ODI side in prime form, the target looked like a walk in the park.

However. in the end it was Windies who were laughing as Cottrell’s brilliance earned them a thrilling 26-run win. The left-arm pacer, who celebrates his wickets with a march and a salute – removed Jonny Bairstow (0) and Jason Roy (2) within the first three overs to give Windies a solid start. A 99-run stand between Eoin Morgan and Ben Stokes helped England recover from 60 for 3 before Cottrell dismissed Eoin Morgan (70) in the 31st over.

He then accounted for the wickets of Moeen Ali (12) and Adil Rashid (15) towards the death as England tumbled from 228-4 to 263 all out. Cottrell, who had taken just 8 wickets in his first 6 ODIs, finished the game with 5 for 46 as Windies drew level in the five-match series.

Delighted with Cottrell’s efforts, Holder was all praise for them and tipped him to be a big star in the future. “You need options in this day and age and Cottrell gave us that extra bit of variation with the ball,” said Holder in the post-match presentation. “I love his energy. His is one for the future. It’s really good to see so many of these players stepping up.”

Earlier in the game, highly-rated Shimron Hetmyer had starred with the bat, scoring 104 off just 83 deliveries to help Windies put up a challenging total.

Morgan rues missed opportunity

England skipper Eoin Morgan, on the other hand, admitted that his side threw away the game after being in control. England were well placed at 228 for 5 in the 40th over before Stokes’ dismissal opened the floodgates. England went on to lose their last five wickets for just 35 runs.

“I wouldn’t say we expected to win, there’s no sense of entitlement at all, but we were certainly in control,” said Morgan. “We were probably in a better position than we were in the first game. But a game is never won right until the end. We just left a little bit too much to do.

“We were beaten by the better side but learning from that isn’t a bad thing,” he added. We’ll see in the next games whether we do learn from it or not.”

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