Phil Simmons backs skippers Jason Holder and Keiron Pollard

11/01/2019

Phil Simmons believes that Jason Holder and newly-appointed white-ball captain Kieron Pollard can bring the best out of their players and have the required experience to take Windies cricket forward. Pollard has been appointed as the T20 and ODI Captain despite last playing an ODI in 2016.

Windies coach Phil Simmons has complete faith in his captains Jason Holder and Kieron Pollard to provide the required experience to the youngsters and take Windies cricket ahead. The Windies had shown tremendous promise in the World Cup with the likes of Andre Russell, Kemar Roach and youngsters like Shai Hope and Shimron Hetmyr but they lacked the required experience in crunch situations to close down games of cricket. Simmons believes that Pollard has this experience and Holder will also learn a lot under Pollard in the limited-overs.

"It (Pollard's ability to take responsibility) showed in the T20Is with India," Simmons told ESPNCricinfo.

"He took the reins and led in those. That's what I expect from him: that responsibility of being captain is going to make him want to always be on top of the runs and leading from the front. He is that kind of a leader - even though he asks you to do something, it is not something he wouldn't do or he wouldn't want to do," he added.

Pollard was a stand-in captain for one of the games in the IPL when Rohit Sharma was rested against KXIP and he had played a match-winning inning of 83 runs, single-handedly winning the game for his side Mumbai Indians. This showed that he has the ability to take responsibility for the team and deliver under pressure.

"His experience in general, and not just the knowledge, but also his ability to involve all the players and his ability to give players challenges but at the same time be on their side - that natural leadership is there. It is something that he will bring a lot to the team," Simmons said,

On the other hand, Simmons believes that Holder's burden has now been reduced as he can concentrate on captaining the Test side and start demanding performances from his team. He was first made the skipper of the Test team back in 2015. With four years of experience under his belt with glimpses of fantastic performances like a double-hundred against England, Holder can now stamp his authority on the team and believe in his players and set up a team for the future with youngsters like Shai Hope and Kraigg Brathwaite.

"With the experience he has now, he should be putting more pressure on a lot of the players to perform. So his role slightly changes, and he gets to relax in the other two formats because sometimes you could see that mind thinking on the field, and then when it comes to batting, the pressure is on," Simmons said.

"Now with him relaxing a little bit more in the other two formats, maybe you'll see a lot more coming from him in the Test matches," he concluded.