Kieron Pollard eyeing World Cup place after IPL heroics

The 31-year-old has not played an ODI for the West Indies for nearly three years but changes behind the scenes could work in his favour

Kieron Pollard remains hopeful of forcing his way into the West Indies' World Cup squad following a restructuring behind the scenes.

Ricky Skerritt last month replaced the much-derided Dave Cameron as CWI president, whose tenure included the end of Dwayne Bravo and Darren Sammy's international careers.

Pollard has not played for the Windies 50-over side since October 2016, though he was involved in the T20 series against India last year.

Chris Gayle's re-integration into the team for the recently drawn ODI series against England offers Pollard hope of a place in the 15-man squad, which must be named before the April 23 deadline.

The 31-year-old provided a timely reminder as to his talent with a sparkling 83 from 31 deliveries to inspire Mumbai Indians to a final ball, three-wicket win over Kings XI Punjab.

“I am a cricketer, I am 31 years of age and I have lot of cricket left in me,” he told reporters.

“Every day I get the opportunity to play, I want to do my best. 

"There has been a lot of turmoil in West Indies cricket over the last couple of years. But we have seen in the last couple of weeks there’s a change.

“Pollard was one of the guys blacklisted. The most I can do every time I step on the cricket field is try to put runs on the board. 

"There’s people there who have the job to select and whatever and we’ll see how that goes.

“As I said, I’m 31, Chris Gayle is still playing, he’s 39, and he’s still whacking it all around.”

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