The Trinidad and Tobago Red Force will look to intensify their training routine with a view to achieving better results in the four-day West Indies Championship tournament.
The Red Force had a disappointing end to their West Indies Championship, losing two of their last three matches in the tournament to finish fourth in the standings behind champions Barbados Pride, second-placed Leeward Islands Hurricanes and third-placed Guyana Harpy Eagles .
Reds coach David Furlonge said that ahead of their last-round match against Guyana, which ended in a rain-affected draw, the players had a frank discussion about the way forward for the franchise and agreed that a greater degree of professionalism if they are to achieve better results.
“We’ve had long discussions about how we’re going to move forward … we’re supposed to be a professional unit and a professional unit doesn’t just practice three days a week. That came from the players. They said a professional unit should practice five days a week because that’s your job,” Furlonge recounted.
“The team also agreed to a more intensive training program where all players will be busy for the full session which is four hours. And approaching the 50-over tournament, we will train six, seven hours a day and that worked for us last year,” he added.
The Red Force coach also noted that Cricket West Indies has outlined minimum fitness standards for contracted players and that they will work towards meeting these requirements as they build towards the Super50. The Red Force resumed training last week with physical and field training.
“Contracted players have to undergo fitness tests before the Super50, which they will have to pass so that it does not affect their financial remuneration,” Furlonge said. “CWI is also saying that players will have to meet certain fitness criteria at franchise level and we will have to work within that framework.”
The head coach of the Reds is also looking towards the future of the franchise and is keen to continue developing players who can make the roster in the years to come.
“We are not only working with the 15 contracted players or the old players. We have a group of about 11 to 14 young players that we have on trial and they are working together with the team,” he explained.
“We’ve had two leg-spinners with us over the last couple of years and a left-arm spinner and a few others who we’ve seen who we’re going to call up for trials. Imran Khan has been working with the young legs and guiding them and they have shown great improvement, so there are some young players that we have groomed over the last year,” Furlonge continued.
He said they have been working with two leg-spinners in Sameer Ali and Kerwin Sirju, left-arm spinner Ryan Bandoo and medium pacer Justin Manick. “We’ve also got left-arm fast bowler Shaaron Lewis who we brought into the team for the last few games and he actually got into the TKR (Trinbago Knight Riders) set-up so he’s got a foot in the door as far as belongs to the Red Forces. the debut.
“Among the batsmen, we have Mbeki Joseph, Crystian Thurton, Leonardo Julien and Jahron Alfred — the all-rounder from Tobago — so we have a lot of young players training with us. Our plan is to call up around 26 young players to have a few trial games with them to see how they will perform and this will be in preparation for the regional 50 overs. We want to add the best players to the set-up to fully prepare for the tournament,” Furlonge explained.
The Red Force coach wants to see more commitment from the invited players as well, saying they need to be all in if they want to break into the franchise team.
“We always tell the players that they have to show commitment. What happens sometimes is you invite a player to train with the team and they come one day and then they don’t…so they have to be committed to the program,” Furlonge explained. We know as guest players you don’t get paid to practice with the team, but if you look at your future and your goal is to get a franchise contract and play in the regional tournament, you can’t go half-way to do that.” , he concluded.
