Welcome Aboard Whatmore !












 

By  Perkins-Tino Bare

Dav Whatmore is expected to finalise his contract with Zimbabwe Cricket as he is expected to sign a 4 year deal which will run through to the next World Cup to be hosted in 2019 by England.

We all saw what the guy can do for our team this past tourney as it was clearly visible in our team`s performance for in spite of the fact that we went out at the group stages with one win and a loss to an associate nation, the boys went down fighting and it is mainly this spirit the winning mentality that Whatmore has to pass on to the players. In Whatmore we not only have a World Cup winning coach but this is one guy who can surely transform the team for it has certainly proved the old adage that just as winning is a habit so is losing true. In Whatmore we have the value of a guy who can indeed instill a winning mentality in the team and make us a better test playing nation.  

Whatmore’s contract with Zimbabwe was to last until the end of the World Cup, but manager Chris Chiketa told ESPNcricinfo that Zimbabwe Cricket had been in discussion and were “hopeful” that there would arrive at an agreement with Whatmore with regard to a longer term. The latest we heard was that Zimbabwe Cricket was just waiting upon his arrival so that he can put ink to paper otherwise discussions had gone remarkably well. He is also expected to selected his backroom staff and this past World Cup (IU know it just ended) he took the likes of Douglas Hondo who was  his bowling coach.  

The coach who is yet to put pen to paper has a lot of work to do as he seeks to pick up from where he left off. After a disappointing World Cup, Whatmore looks to build a successful team and improve on the teams ODI rankings if they are to gain an automatic qualification into the next World Cup. The Chevrons are currently ranked 10th and the new ICC regulations sees the top 7 ranked teams gaining an automatic qualification whilst the rest battle it out together with the associate nations for the remaining slots.

The coach had earlier bemoaned the lack of adequate game time to condition the players for such events as the World Cup whereby  they were frustrated the many hopefuls and in as much as we would like to believe  that this time round it was us who choked, no its actually the opposite we were just outright disappointing. Whatmore said interview, that the lack of game time especially prior to the tourney allowed Zimbabwe to slip up several times in the World Cup. “Please, we’d like to play more cricket,” Whatmore said , “If they’d had enough matches, then I’m sure during certain defining moments, they would be equal to it.”

Zimbabwe however expects India in July before Pakistan and Ireland tours are yet to be confirmed . Zimbabwe is also highly expected course play, yes you guessed it, our long time rival Bangladesh where we look to settle some scores after Steve Mangongo left us in a quagmire in that respect following arguably our worst defeat ever .

Whatmore will however bemoan the absence of Zimbabwean players at the upcoming IPL as no player from our team was contracted not even Brendan Taylor who`s with Nottinghamshire or Sean Williams. This is huge contrast to the Proteas who are boasting an average of 2 players per team and what they are going to gain from such an experience is absolutely magnificent, 60 000 fans singing their hearts out ..Learning to play under serious pressure, crowds over 60 000 and the noise in the stadium.Its something our players hardly get to experience.

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