T-20 World Cup: West Indies close to Super-8 due to Hetmyer’s innings

Mumbai: Shimron Hetmyer not only played an inning of 85 runs in just 34 balls against Zimbabwe last night but along with bringing his team West Indies closer to the Super-8, it also kept India away from the semi-finals! West Indies defeated Zimbabwe by 107 runs in the Super-8 match held at the Wankhede Stadium on Monday, which Hope termed as a confidence-boosting victory before the matches against South Africa and India.

Hetmyer hit seven sixes and as many fours, due to which West Indies scored 254 runs for six wickets, which is the second highest score in the history of T20 World Cup. Hope told reporters after the match:

Looking at the way Hetmyer is batting, I feel that his talent was wasted to some extent by being sent down the batting order. He is such a good batsman that he can bat in any kind of situation whether it is spin or fast bowling. He has proved to be a valuable player at number three. He plays this number with complete freedom and that is what we want from him. He has proved to be an important player for us in this tournament, we gave him this role from the series against South Africa and he performed it well.

Hetmyer has been a lower-order batsman for most of his career and has batted between fifth and seventh as a finisher, but in the current tournament he has shown impressive batting in the upper order. Regarding West Indies’ fifth consecutive win in the tournament, Hope said, ‘The way we are playing definitely gives us a lot of confidence. This is a great start, which will give us a lot of confidence for the matches against South Africa and then India.