PATIALA: Despite the mauling India received at the hands of the West Indies during the recent cricket tour, Navjot Singh Sidhu has returned home “more than satisfied and very happy.”
Sitting at home in a relaxed mood, he said, “I had something to prove that I was not afraid of pace. In front of the quickest bowlers in the world, I think I did fairly well registering the highest total of nearly 700 in 13 innings during the tour.
He said there was one thing he wanted to accomplish and that was a century which he got in the fourth Test at Kingston,
Asked what he considered to be the main reason for India’s debacle, he said the West Indies “have the best battery of quickies in the world. With not one but four real fast bowlers pounding at you, there is constant pressure on the batsman.
He said the very fact that bowlers like Patrick Patterson and Winston Benjamin did not find a place in the West Indies team showed the calibre of their attack.
Sidhu said though all West Indies bowJers were very good, Ian Bishop was the quickest. He also had the ability to make the ball rise awkwardly from short of good Jength posing many problems to batsman.
He rebutted the criticism that the Indian cricketers lacked application and were no serious. “The team was all there to play cricket, It is just that they (Caribbeans) outplayed us.”
Article extracted from this publication >> May 19, 1989
