Alick Athanaze has certainly advanced his claims
that he should now indeed be making his Test
debut for the West Indies when the Series gets
underway.
Athanaze, emerged as the Regional 4Day tournament’s
highest run scorer. He amassed an overly impressive 647
runs aggregate from his 10-tournament innings. His nearest
rival was Trinidad & Tobago Red Force captain Darren
Bravo, some distance behind with 446 runs scored from
his 10 crease appearances. Guyana Harpy Eagles captain
Leon Johnson, who had announced his intended retirement
from international cricket just after the tournament’s third
round matches had been concluded, had the satisfaction of
finishing third on the highest run scorer standings with 388
runs from 10 innings batted.
In addition to being the tournament’s
highest run scorer, Athanaze also
bagged the majority of the remaining
batting honours. His two centuries
gave him claim to the most hundreds
award, as did his four fifties for that
of the most half-centuries. His 64.70
average was the very best among all
batsmen and he also took the honours
for striking the most boundaries, a
whopping 79 in total.
His scores in the ten innings he batted
in this year’s Regional 4Day were as
follows: 41, 51, 141,11, 81. 97, 128,
38, 59, 0.
photo
Although he was included in the squad for the West Indies’ recent, losing, two-Test tour to South
Africa, Athanaze’s role was incomprehensibly relegated to that of bench warmer and towel- carrier.
This while the Tour Selectors exercised their foolhardy preference for continuing with others, the aptest
description for whom would be that of tried and proven failures.
Born December 7, 1998) in Dominica Athanze made his List A debut for the West Indies Under-19s
in the 2016–17 Regional Super50 on 25 January 2017. In November 2017, he was named in the West
Indies squad for the 2018 Under-19 Cricket World Cup. Following the West Indies’ matches in the
tournament, the International Cricket Council (ICC) named Athanaze as the rising star of the squad. He
became the second batsman for the West Indies to score two centuries in one tournament, and finished
as the competition’s leading run-scorer, with 418 runs.
In June 2018, Athanaze was named to the Cricket West Indies B Team squad for the inaugural edition
of the Global T20 Canada tournament. He made his first-class debut for the Windward Islands in the
2018–19 Regional Four Day Competition on 6 December 2018. In October 2019, he was named in the
Windward Islands’ squad for the 2019–20 Regional Super50 tournament.