Alick Athanaze needs 5 more to reach 200 one day international runs.
Having played just six innings in the limited overs’ format, he’s fought hard, hopped around, seen pressure, tackled it and with it, managed both pace and spin with a sense of assurance that the West Indies cricket needs today.
In a team where Lara was once the saviour after which there came about capable but, pale shadows such as Darren Bravo, being a left hander has its plusses.
There’ll be a lot many eyes on you and purely out of the huge expectation that you’ll save the day for the West Indies akin to how the Prince of Trinidad did and with some pomp.
But then there are always the minuses, the flaws.
There are also the minuses, the pitfalls. The biggest being that the pressure of expectations can get to you. Not everyone’s Shivnarine Chanderpaul at the end of the day.
But then, in the little that we have seen of Alick Athanaze, it can be said and with a certain degree of confidence that the avid youngster won’t fizzle out like that.
The bright young batsman from Dominica is cut out for the West Indies. It’s where he belongs.
And the numbers speak their tale, however small they may look at the moment.
Here’s a case in point- 132 of his 195 ODI runs have come via hits through the fence.
For someone who’s not anything but the Hulk with the cricket bat, Athanaze hits the cricket ball with power and his timing carries a whiff of precision.
His shuffle and adjustment at the crease offer a sense of readihness the team needs.
A sense of not giving up without without a fight; the quintessential West Indian trait the teams belonging to the days of the yore displayed, precisely the quality that is admirable in some of the present gen.
As a batsman, Athanaze seems to have set high standards for himself- the very fact that he has already Test debuted and scored some gritty runs against an opponent no less mighty than India was a good sign for the game in the Caribbean.
The 47 might not have come in a winning cause or for that matter in any storm-curtailing event, but carried the intent one needs from the present day youngsters to pen their own chapters in West Indian cricketing history.
Rarely have knocks that aren’t even a half century carried much weight as Alick Athanaze’s 47 that came in the game’s longest format.
But a few weeks ago his debut knock in Test cricket, which didn’t even yield a fifty gave viewers an indication about his mega potential.
How often has a 47 been admired in international Test match cricket?
Athanaze stayed out to pressure himself so he could rescue his team that was drowning in it as India’s Ashwin, Jadeja and Siraj kept blanking out what was otherwise a promising batting order.
In the first Test held a quarter of a year back at Windsor Park, Roseau, the West Indies batsmen departed soon as they came.
On a turf where India regaled and the hosts were found to be derailed, Brathwaite, Chanderpaul, Holder and Blackwood together accounted for 64 first inning runs. No more.
And then there was a captain Alick Athanaze, who aligned focus with temerity to produce 47 much-needed runs as if neither the sharply turning wicket bothered him or India’s behemoth match winners.
In a sport where it’s often said that a good beginning is only half the job, Athanaze’s West Indian journey is likely to put bowlers out of job.
He’s not afraid; a fundamental quality to measure the worth of a quality batsman.
It isn’t hard to see that the batter who’s not a man of too many words is fast becoming a batsman with too many dot balls to his name; just the trait you need to rescue your team.
One of Dominica’s most determined sons would soon play a Test match at his favourite batsman Brian Lara’s home ground: Trinidad and Tobago.
Even as Athanaze missed out in scoring what could again have been a fifty, his 115-ball-grind, a much needed one for the West Indies team, saw 37 precious runs.
Had he seen the way the left hander fared in the middle on what was clearly a testing surface, one reckons Lara himself would have clapped in admiration.
But then it’s not any everyday phenomenon (nowadays) to see the present-day Windies batsmen to play akin to the cult heroes of the yesteryears.
Putting themselves under pressure thanks to dot ball accumulation and the failure at rotating the strike, none of which have or will ever help the West Indies often makes their batsmen’s life difficult.
But like a blessing amid these hard-fought times, Alick Athanaze has arrived with unwavering commitment and perhaps even a sense of maturity.
Which is why rallying around the West Indies again seems not a bad idea and actually, a reprieve for Kraigg Brathwaite and team (in Tests). And also a new reason to Hope for good times for Shai’s team. Isn’t it?