Playing for Windies is always his main goal, Carlos Brathwaite defends Andre Russell

08/03/2019

Windies T20 skipper Carlos Brathwaite has stepped in to defend his teammate and friend Andre Russell, who recently ruled himself out of West Indies' first two T20Is against India starting on August 3. The T20 sensation, however, represented the Vancouver Knights in the Global T20 game on Friday.

The big-hitting allrounder has had recurring fitness issues and was also ruled out of the World Cup owing to a knee injury. After surgery, he made his comeback in the ongoing Global T20 Canada and was supposed to participate in the three-match T20I series against India. But on Friday, he revealed that he experienced "some discomfort" while playing in the Global T20 Canada and then unveiled his unavailability to the West Indies selectors.

However, hours later, Russell turned out to play for Vancouver Knights against Edmonton Royals on August 2. Following that, the West Indies T20 skipper has come forward to express that Russell’s criticism is uncalled for and defended his injury issues.

"I think he's been knocked in the press a bit because of his injury woes. And I think it's easy for us to see him hobbling around the field and just take for granted that he's injured but we can also look at it on the other side and say he can be home, he could be elsewhere and not trying to play for the West Indies,” Brathwaite said in the pre-match press conference in Florida.

"And speaking for myself as captain of the T20 team and speaking for myself as Andre's friend, whenever we speak about playing for West Indies, that's always his main goal. And we've seen in the World Cup -whether he was 100% or not, it's debatable - but the fact that he wanted to be at the World Cup, wanted to pull on the shirt and wanted to perform for the people in the West Indies and his mates in the dressing room,” he added.

Brathwaite further said that the defending champions of the WT20 need Russell fully fit ahead of the big tournament in 2020. “In the dressing room, in and around the team, he's a big character, very jovial and in my eyes, a leader in the dressing room as well. But obviously, if we need to get him ready for the Twenty20 World Cup, we have to do without him for a couple of series, I prefer that than pushing him in this series and making a long term injury.”

Jason Mohammed, who last played for West Indies in the ODI series against Bangladesh in July 2018, has been named as Russell’s replacement.