West Indies v England: Jason Roy looks ahead to ODI series, talks IPL and James Bond
Friday 3 March 2017 20:39, UK
In his latest blog, Jason Roy looks ahead to England’s ODI series in the West Indies, dishing the dirt on who is a nervous flyer and who is staying sun-safe in the Caribbean, plus talks the IPL and James Bond...
I've never been to the West Indies before.
We've been here about a week now, and I'm absolutely loving it! The scenery is amazing, and the beaches are beautiful.
It isn't all just swimming and sunbathing though - certainly not for Stokesy anyway, he's wisely sticking to the shade or the factor 50 - as the boys have been putting in the work too, training hard ahead of this series.
We've got to win these next three games, with Friday's first being hugely important. We want to set the right tone and put down a marker.
To win any away series is a fantastic achievement, so the boys are just excited to get going to try and do that.
I'm a bit of a film buff so I brought my iPad out here with me with a bunch of movies on it, but I haven't been able to watch one of them yet. It has been a full on tour so far.
I love going to the cinema, it's one of my favourite things - a bit of pick and mix too, and that's me set - so it was very funny when our media manager came over and showed me I was featured in one of their #CricketMovies on the England twitter account to celebrate the Oscars.
Casino 'ROY'ale. Yes! I'm having some of that; I could see myself as the next James Bond.
Me and the boys then tried to think up a few other examples but they didn't quite make the grade for public consumption.
We've had a couple of new additions to our touring party, with Alex Hales re-joining the team and my Surrey mate Tom Curran getting a call-up - I'm letting him fend for himself at the minute, but I've got his back if needed.
It's great to see Halesy back in training. He is chomping at the bit to get going, but he's not too sure still how his hand is going to cope after the break. Hopefully he can make a comeback sooner rather than later.
Tom has done well with the Lions this winter and deserves his call-up. He brings a whole lot of things on the field, but also off the field he is a great guy.
He's a fighter, a competitor, and you always know he is going to give 100 per cent. That's what our team is all about, so I'm sure he will fit in well.
We had a very small box of a plane taking us to Antigua ahead of Friday's first ODI. It was so small the team had to be split into two flights.
The guys in the first group were sending messages to us in the second, saying it was the worst flight ever, sick bags etc.
I think they had the worst of it though as ours was ok. It was a bit sketchy at times, but we survived, although the way Sam Billings was carrying on might make you think otherwise. He was the most nervous, Liam Dawson as well.
I feel good going into this series. I hit 79 in our first warm-up win, and though I didn't play in the second, due to a finger bruise, I'm in a great head space.
Getting signed up for the IPL was a real high point. For me, it didn't even matter what the price was, I just wanted to be involved.
I did message Stokesy straight away after he was signed though, saying 'what is going on?!' He couldn't believe it, he was absolutely stunned by the amount he went for.
At about 4am, I woke myself up for the auction, and accidentally my missus too, who I don't think was best pleased.
I couldn't find a stream of it, so I was just flicking through twitter. I saw it come up 'Jason Roy unsold in the first round', which was disappointing - so I got up, had a little pace around, got a coffee.
Then when I looked at twitter again, it said I was sold, and I was buzzing! I just can't wait to get over there now.
To have six England boys picked up - joining Billings and Buttler already out there - is a huge achievement! I messaged the others congratulating them too.
But come April, there will be a bit of rivalry. If I'm facing one of them, I'll want to get one up over them.
I'm teaming up with the Gujarat Lions, and hopefully will get to open the batting with Brendon McCullum.
I've actually already just played with him in the Pakistan Super League with the Lahore Qalandars and there's not many better to learn off than him.
It was fascinating to see how he goes about his cricket training, and the way he plays. He is constantly looking to test the boundaries and take risks: many say that good cricket is scoring a six and then taking a single afterwards but he begs to differ and wants to hit 6, 6, 6 and keep going.
We had some great guys at Qalandars. Grant Elliott, another New Zealander, was a huge character.
He did a 'bat drop' celebration after hitting a six to win us one game. I had no idea he was going to do it but he does have that in his locker.
I'm thinking of pulling something similar out of the bag in this series. Maybe a Peter Crouch-style robot? It would have to be in the third ODI I think though, with the series already wrapped up.
Cricket's a funny old game, so watch this space…
Watch West Indies take on England in the first of three ODIs, from 1pm this Friday on Sky Sports 2.