Chase talks about his style of leadership ahead of Aus series as his lack of captaincy experience surfaces.
Chase: ‘I know how to bring the best out of players’.
The new Test captain of the West Indies, Roston Chase, thinks his “calm style” would help his players perform at their highest level. Chase, 33, was selected as the Test skipper despite having little experience as a captain and little recent playing time in red-ball cricket. He last participated in a Test match in March 2023 and had previously captained the West Indies in two white-ball internationals. The three-match series against Australia at home, which starts in Bridgetown on June 25, is Chase’s first task as Test captain.
“I’ve never captained a senior team in terms of the West Indies team or Barbados team [in Tests]. But I’ve captained eight teams in the West Indies before,” Chase said during an interaction facilitated by FanCode, the official broadcaster for West Indies in India. “I think I’m a good leader. Obviously, I’m not perfect. I’m still learning.”
“I did most of my captaining in my early days like school level and local divisions. I think I have a calm style [as captain]. I really know how to bring out the best in the players that I have.”
Daren Sammy, who took over as West Indies’ all-format coach in April of this year, will be Chase’s coach.
“The captaincy conversations that I had would have been with the coach, Daren Sammy, and Miles Bascombe from the board,” Chase said. “I’ve been out for two years, but after Sammy approached me about coming back because I always wanted to come back and play Test cricket.
“I was exploring the white ball and the franchise cricket for a bit. And he asked me about coming back and I thought about it and I ended up making the decision to come back.”