Matthews keen to play despite spectre of COVID-19

West Indies all-rounder Hayley Matthews is open to the idea of travelling during the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic once the right precautionary measures are put in place.

While there has been much debate about the men’s team travelling to England for a three-match test series starting next month July 8, Matthews said if called upon to represent the West Indies or play overseas, she would be happy to do so.

“Once the right precautionary measures are taken. Obviously, it is a time when you have to think about safety first. But I don’t think the board or boards would look to put us in any danger. Once it is a matter that the right precautionary measures are taken and our safety is put first I don’t think it would be a huge problem,” she said.

Matthews who once held the West Indies vice-captaincy but found herself in trouble last year and received an eight-match ban by Cricket West Indies for disciplinary reasons, said she is now refocused and ready to represent her country.

“When you play a game in cricket, you always want to be improving, so whether it be batting, bowling, fielding, I am always looking to get better. Obviously, because of everything that has been going on, it delays that next step. I think sometimes it is a good thing in cricket when you just get that little break to kind of refocus and mentally get yourself back into it. Hopefully, when I go out there again, I could be right back into nick and doing better than I was before,” Matthews said.

During this time when many athletes are restricted from training, Matthews said that it has not been a major challenge for her.

She explained: “It has been pretty alright, to be honest. The main thing for me I guess is to try to stay motivated. We have been given a programme by our trainer at Cricket West Indies that I think the entire team has been working on at this point. For us, it is about making sure we get in the workouts obviously.

“A lot of the countries are different now at this time. Different rules, different regulations, so for us here in Barbados we knew we had the lockdown over the past couple weeks, so the nets were not available. But it is about getting in those workouts.

“Our trainers give us some gym equipment to buy that we went ahead and got, that we could get those workouts done. And even the workouts that he gave us, a lot of them were bodyweight, stuff that we were able to do.”

The youngest West Indies player to score a century in 2018 during the home series against South Africa, Matthews had a few major tournaments lined up for this year before (COVID-19). She was expected to be part of the series against South Africa which was scheduled for the end of May, early June and the world cup qualifiers at the end of July.

In addition, Matthews and West Indies women’s captain Stafanie Taylor were supposed to attend the Indian Premier League trial matches and the 100 ball tournament in August which is now cancelled in England.

“We are hoping that obviously the next couple of months everywhere is able to open back up and hopefully we can get to the Big Bash in Australia (October),” she said.

The 22-year-old opener was also expected to captain the defending limited over champions Barbados but a week before travelling to Guyana to defend their 50 Over and T20 titles, the tournament was cancelled because of COVID-19.

Last year at the National Stadium in Providence, Guyana, Barbados did the double when they defeated the host and captured the Colonial Medical Insurance Women’s Super 50 championship and the Cricket West Indies Women’s T20 Blaze title.

Describing it as unfortunate, Matthews said: “The girls were into a lot of training, so it is a bit unfortunate it got cancelled when it did. But as I said safety first.”

morissalindsay@barbadostoday.bb