Sarwan Excited At Captaining Guyana

By Orin Davidson
Within seven days Ramnaresh Sarwan will make his debut as Guyana captain in the Stanford 20/20 cup and is eagerly looking forward to making another major step forward in his career.

“Obviously it will be a bit different, I have not had much opportunity to captain Guyana, but I am sure I will get the full support of my teammates. I am looking forward to the 20/20, it will not take me long to adjust to it, “ Sarwan told Cricket International in an exclusive interview last weekend at Floyd Bennett Park.

For the better part of three years, the right hander has been playing bridesmaid, initially to West Indies captain to Brian Lara as his deputy and then to Shivnarine Chanderpaul at both Test and Regional levels.

But he is confident his batting will not suffer as a result of the additional responsibility and expects to do a good job leading Guyana and possibly when his time comes to take over from Lara at Test and One day International level.

The stroke-making West Indies #3 is enjoying the ODI form of his life, climbing the world rankings to number two behind Australian Adam Gilchrist, and gave the New York crowd a sampling of his class with a stroke filled 70 last Saturday in the Caribbean All Stars first game against United States All Stars at Floyd Bennett field.

It was Sarwan’s first game in a representative West Indies squad in America and he loved every minute of the weekend.

“It was really nice, we have not had this opportunity to play together as a team in front of the crowd here, it was a great atmosphere and we really enjoyed it,” he stated

Sarwan pointed out that the experience was more relaxing than international cricket and not as mentally draining. “We had a good time, it was a good experience,” he stated.

Asked whether they would do it again in the Big Apple Sarwan declared. “ I am sure most of the guys will want to come back here and play more cricket. They (spectators) don’t get to see us live too often, they came out and supported us and I am sure they had a good time as well.”

The Guyanese’s current brilliant one-day form which produced an average of 91 in the Digicel series against India and helped West Indies whip them 4-1, does not detract though, from his commitment to Test competition where he is ranked 28.

“I prefer Test cricket more than One Day cricket, obviously I have been working hard on my one day game. I think the key to one day cricket is trying to rotate the strike and analyzing situations. I think once you are able to analyze situations, you have a good chance to perform consistent (ly). Obviously you would make one or two mistakes in One Day cricket, but in Test cricket you would not get away with it because of the field placements and stuff like that. But I also love Test cricket and that is the ultimate,” Sarwan explained.

On his troublesome shoulder that has severely weakened his throwing, Sarwan cannot put a finger on the problem presently.

“It is not something specific you can find out what is wrong , it is just that I can’t throw and will probably take two to two and a half years of therapy to get it back to where it was.

But as is clearly obvious, the shoulder is not affecting his batting.

“It doesn’t,” he said adding, “I just have to continue working on it and hopefully it will get better,” the batsman stated.

The Guyanese also shrugs off any possibility of burn out among his West Indies teammates ahead of their heavy schedule for the remainder of this year prior to the World Cup next year which West Indies will host.

“It is an opportunity for us to get ourselves peaking in time for the World Cup. I have been playing with a lot of niggles, knee problems and hamstring problems, apart from that I don’t think any international sportsman plays injury free. It is just a matter of me taking care of my body and getting healthy.”
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