Strauss offers no excuses

KINGSTON – England captain Andrew Strauss offered no excuses as his side were bowled out for 51, their third-lowest in history, on the way to a humiliating innings and 23 run defeat against the West Indies on Saturday.

Strauss blamed his batsmen and believes there must be plenty of soul-searching if his side is to avoid another heavy defeat in the four-Test series which continues when the second Test opens on Thursday in Antigua.’It’s very clear where we went wrong – our batting in the second innings was pretty poor – and there are no excuses for it,’ Strauss told reporters after man of the match, strike bowler Jerome Taylor plundered 5-11 at Sabina Park.’Jerome Taylor had a fantastic spell of bowling, but the pitch was not misbehaving terribly, so as a batting unit we have to hold our hands up and admit that we were not good enough.’Strauss believes that each member of the team has to take personal responsibility and try to do better as the West Indies celebrated their first win in 17 matches against England since 2000.’I think the reality of the situation is that we worked really hard for the last two days – the bowlers did an exceptional job to keep up in touch in the game – and we got ourselves into a pressure period in the match we did not handle very well,’ he said.’When I started the captaincy I said that we all have to take personal responsibility for our performances. We need to see how bad it feels to lose in that manner and use it as motivation to move forward.’Strauss rejected suggestions that there is still some underlying tension, following the removal of Peter Moores as coach and the resignation of Kevin Pietersen as captain.’I just can’t believe for one moment that when you are out there in the middle and Jerome Taylor is running in to bowl at you, that you would be thinking about anything that happened before,’ he said. – Nampa-AFP