Former West Indian legend Courtney Walsh took over from Guis Logie as the head coach of the West Indies women’s cricket team in October 2020. He will now be replaced by Shane Deitz as the new head coach as CWI has decided against renewing the contracts of the head coach as well as the assistant coaches. In this article, we will be touching down on the journey of Courtney Walsh as the head coach of the West Indies women’s cricket team.
The West Indies women’s cricket team achieved a few remarkable feats under Courtney Walsh. Starting with a remarkable home series win against Pakistan in One Day Internationals, as the home side managed to clinch the 5-match ODI series with a 3-2 margin. They also went on to whitewash Pakistan in the T20I series with a 3-0 margin. Another memorable moment came when they whitewashed Pakistan, this time around in an ODI series in Pakistan.
One of the highlights of Courtney Walsh’s stint as the head coach of the women’s side was their very impressive campaign in the ICC Women’s ODI World Cup 2022 in New Zealand. They managed to get off to one of their most promising starts in the ODI World Cup in New Zealand, with back-to-back wins over New Zealand and England sending a strong message for all the other teams to kickstart their campaign.
However, their tournament went down the hill as they just managed to win one game in their next five games including a washout game against South Africa. Their only victory came against Bangladesh after a promising start to the tournament. They went down to Australia with a heavy 157-run defeat in the semi-final.
They had a poor win percentage of 29% in the T20I format. However, a slightly better performance in the ODI format with a win percentage of 34% for West Indies under Courtney Walsh. Their below-par showing in the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup in South Africa dented their overall performances in T20Is in recent times. They dropped their first two games and then eventually went on to win their last couple of games to finish the tournament on a high. Unfortunately, their performances weren’t enough to earn them a place in the knockout stages of the tournament.
Their below-par performances in the World Cup potentially turned out to be the deciding factor behind the change in personnel in the coaching department for West Indies. Shane Deitz steps in to take over as the new head coach for the West Indies women’s cricket team. Before this stint, he was responsible for coaching the Netherlands women’s side and he had immense success during his stint with the Netherlands. He helped the Netherlands to regain the ODI status and guided them to new heights in the ODI and the T20I format. He recently stepped down as the head coach of the Netherlands women’s side to take over the coaching duties for the West Indies side.
“We have a lot of work to do though as the reality is we are behind the top few sides in the world and we need to bridge that gap and become competitive again to challenge for World Cups in the future. I do believe though the nucleus is there to create a world-class competitive side and that is what I will aim to do. The standard of women’s cricket is at an all-time high and we need to strive to reach those heights through good planning, a lot of hard work and then executing on the pitch.” Shane Deitz on his vision as the head coach of the West Indies women’s cricket team.
West Indies women’s tour to Australia in October, later in the year will be his first assignment as the head coach of the side.
(Quotes sourced from ESPNCricinfo)