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Brandon Moyo Bulawayo Bureau

ZIMBABWE’S senior men cricket team coach Dave Houghton is anticipating a tough battle when the Chevrons face West Indies in the first Test match at Queens Sports Club here in Bulawayo from Saturday.

The Chevrons yesterday held their first training session in Bulawayo ahead of their two-Test series against the West Indies.

Coming from a white ball series against Ireland in Harare, nine players, who took part in that contest against the Irish, are expected to be part of the Test team alongside the six who played in the recently ended Zimbabwe XI and Windies warm-up match which concluded in a draw at Bulawayo Athletic Club on Monday.

Houghton said they are expecting a tough challenge from the Windies given the experience deficit between the two sides. Houghton is, however, optimistic that they will give their all on the field to compete.

“These games are very tough games for us, we are playing against a very skilled opponent and the gulf in expertise and experience is huge but that doesn’t mean we go in without any confidence, we have our tactics, we have the way that we want to play against them, we are playing at home and I expect us to be out there competing against them ball by ball throughout this Test series,” said Houghton.

Since taking over as Zimbabwe’s head coach mid-last year, this will be Houghton’s first Test assignment, having been playing white-ball cricket and he believes this will present real opportunity to go up individually against the opposition.

Among the players present during Zimbabwe’s first training session at Queens Sports Club yesterday were Chamunorwa Chibhabha, fast bowler Bradley Evans, leg spinner Brandon Mavuta and batsman Tafadzwa Tsiga.

Zimbabwe and West Indies are preparing to square off in the prolonged version of the game for the first time since 2017 at Queens Sports Club in Bulawayo, with the first five-day contest taking place from February 4-8. The second match is scheduled for February 12-16 at the same venue.

Zimbabwe have never triumphed in this format of the game against the Windies, with the two teams having played each other 10 times since 2000. The closest Zimbabwe came to conquering the Windies was in the first ever clash between the two in Test cricket in March 2000.

The match took place in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago. Zimbabwe’s target was just 99 runs to win the match and a batting line up that had the likes of Andy Flower, Neil Johnson, Murray Goodwin and Alistair Campbell was rolled over for 63 runs in 47 overs for the Windies to win by 35 runs.

Houghton says he hopes to see a huge crowd coming in to support the Chevrons.

“It would be great to see the crowds turn out in numbers and I hope we can entertain them,” he said.

Zimbabwe head into battle without the services of Test skipper Sean Williams who is out nursing a finger injury. All-rounders Sikandar Raza and Ryan Burl will also be missing from the red ball series after being allowed to travel abroad to play franchise Twenty20 cricket and the experience of Craig Ervine and Gary Ballance will come in handy.