It Was A Great Day For Me - Shillingford

It Was A Great Day For Me - Shillingford

The Dominica fans enjoyed watching Shane Shillingford pick up five wickets on his home ground

©WICB Media/Randy Brooks Photo

West Indian off-spinner Shane Shillingford couldn't have asked for much more on his return to Dominica as a Test cricketer, taking five wickets on day one against Zimbabwe.

His haul of five for 59, allied to Marlon Samuels taking three for 10, bundled Zimbabwe out for 175 before West Indies closed on 114 for two in reply.

The performance was the ideal follow-up to Shillingford's man-of-the-match effort of nine wickets in the opening Test in Barbados, which West Indies won by nine wickets.

bet365 make West Indies 1/80 to go on and win the match with Zimbabwe 25/1 and the draw 33/1.

"It was a great day for me," he said. "It was wonderful to come out here and get more wickets in front of my home supporters and my family. Last year I got 10 wickets here against Australia, so this year I’m looking to get even more.

"We believe we can win this match and take the series. As the captain said before a ball was bowled, we are looking to win this match and make it six Test wins in a row."

Although Zimbabwe have been struggling badly against spin in the series, but Shillingford has had to bowl intelligently to get his wickets.

"When I saw them sweeping I was happy," he said. "For the right-handers, when they tried to sweep I tried not to bowl too straight but to bowl a little wider of the off-stump.

"I noticed they then changed their game plan. I felt our change of tactics worked quite well and we held them very tight. They had to look for other ways to score their runs."

If all goes to plan for the West Indies, Shillingford will be able to watch his batsmen build a big lead, and he is backing Chris Gayle, unbeaten on 61 overnight, to score a century on day two.

"We all know Chris is a man who can change a game at anytime and he is a threat for any opponent. He is a confident player and even when he wasn’t getting the scores he remained confident.

"It was good to see the way he batted this evening. He started off well with a good half-century and I just hope he can go on to get a big one (century) tomorrow."

© Cricket World 2013