We sent a message to Chris to try and win it with a bonus point: Bravo

A high-impact performance from Chris Gayle gave West Indies a comprehensive six-wicket win over Sri Lanka in the first match of the tri-series. Chris Gayle, who did not make impact in the Champions Trophy, batted beautifully in the first match against Sri Lanka and scored an impressive century. He also helped West Indies to gain a bonus point by achieving the target in 37.5 overs.

West Indies captain Dwayne Bravo was satisfied with Gayle’s performance. “In the 29th over, we sent a message to Chris to try and win it with a bonus point,” Bravo said after the match. “It will ease pressure off him. I know, at the back of his mind, that he felt he wasn’t scoring big runs. But he knows how important a player he is for us. I am very happy that he scored a hundred again and batted deep into the innings. When Chris is in that kind of form, it’s only good for us as a team and for West Indies cricket.”

Sri Lanka got off to a good start as Upul Tharanga and Jayewardene put on 62 runs for the first wicket. But after the wickets of Jayewardene and Sangakkara , Sri Lanka were never able to boost the run-rate and eventually were bowled out for 208.

“One of their best batters is batting up the order and the other, Sangakkara, is batting at No. 3,” Bravo said. “We know their middle order and lower order is not that experienced, so we had to keep picking up wickets, that was the game plan. Ravi Rampaul, Kemar Roach and Sunil Narine said they’d do it for us. One can’t forget Darren Sammy‘s spell. I think that killed the momentum in the Sri Lankan innings. Bowling them out for 208 was a fantastic effort by the bowlers.”

“In the Champions Trophy, we were not disappointed with the way we played, especially in the league stages,” he said. “We felt the way we exited the tournament was unfortunate, but as a squad we think that we did a lot of right things. That game against South Africa could have gone either way and, who knows, we could have reached the semi-finals or the final. But we take a lot of positives out of England. We were disappointed with the way that game was called off but we used it to get stronger as a group.”

Dwayne Bravo also backed Roach to perform better in the next match against India. “There was never an issue with Kemar’s bowling performance,” Bravo said. “In the first game [of the Champions Trophy] against Pakistan, Kemar was the bowler who got us in the position we were in. Today, he created chances and that is what we want from him. One or two bad games don’t say anything. He’s still one of our best bowlers. It’s good to have someone like Tino Best on the sidelines, that’s good bench strength for us as a team.”