England head coach Jon Lewis revealed his players were “distraught” after defeat to West Indies sent them crashing out of the T20 World Cup in Dubai.
Lewis’ side had no answer to big-hitting West Indies openers Hayley Matthews and Qiana Joseph, who both smashed quickfire half-centuries as England slumped to a six-wicket defeat.
England, who had comfortably won all three of their previous Group B fixtures in Sharjah, were restricted to 141 for seven and West Indies cruised past their winning target with two overs to spare.
Heartbreak in Dubai 💔
Defeat to West Indies means we exit the World Cup at the group stages.
One game doesn’t define us, this group will be back. pic.twitter.com/DjQ0jrwJh2
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) October 15, 2024
Joseph struck her first international half-century, 52 off 38 balls, but was dropped four times – by Sophia Dunkley on six, Alice Capsey on 31 and twice by Maia Bouchier on 48 and 52 – while two other tougher chances went begging.
When asked about England’s sloppy fielding, Lewis said: “I haven’t spoken to the players about what they’ve seen out there. Obviously, really distraught.
“We’ve been knocked out of a World Cup. (Dropped catches) are obviously something that’s been reasonably common at this stadium.
“We didn’t execute as well as we have done for probably the past year or so with the ball, and in the field we dropped a lot of catches, and you can’t afford to drop six catches.
“Fair play to the West Indies. I thought they got it pretty much bang on tactically in terms of attacking the powerplay and they made it really, really tricky for us.
“But, yeah, we weren’t at our best today, which is obviously unfortunate for us.”
England had beaten Bangladesh, South Africa and Scotland in Sharjah before travelling to Dubai to take on West Indies at the International Stadium.
West Indies recovered from a 10-wicket defeat to South Africa in their opening group match with wins against Scotland and Bangladesh.
West Indies and South Africa pipped England for a semi-final place on net run-rate, while Lewis said his players would bounce back from a sobering defeat.
He added: “That’s the World Cup, isn’t it? It’s pretty brutal. So, it will take a bit of time. The players will be really reflective. We’ve got a really strong group.
“The group will stick together. That’s one thing they definitely will do. They work well together and they work for each other and they’ll support each other and the staff will rally around them and support them as best we can.
“The reality of the situation is we didn’t play well enough today and we got beat by a better side on the day.
“So that’s sport and that’s World Cup sport and it’s a knockout game.”
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