Former West Indies captain and current team coordinator Clive Lloyd (centre, facing the camera) talks with members of the Windies team during a practice session in Bridgetown yesterday. The West Indies face Bangladesh today. - Reuters

Tony Becca, Contributing Editor

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados:

THE WEST Indies take on Bangladesh at the lovely and impressive Kensington Oval here today in a match of academic interest only, and for the local fans, disappointingly and embarrassingly so.

After starting the World Cup with dreams of winning the title and with a first-round performance of three victories out of three, the West Indies have lost all four matches to date in the Super Eights and, after South Africa's march to victory on Tuesday, they no longer have a chance of making it to the semi-finals.

The West Indies, like Bangladesh, are on two points. After today they take on England on Saturday in their final assignment, and with Australia already on 12 points, with New Zealand and Sri Lanka on 10 each and with South Africa on eight each, and with only two points for a win, it is impossible forthem to catch much more pass any of them.

With Bangladesh, also but not surprisingly so, out of the running for a place in the top four, today's encounter, between two of the bottom four teams in the ICC one-day rankings and between two of the bottom four teams in the Super Eights, is for positioning only.

It is, however, also for pride - and especially so where the West Indies are concerned.

So far, the West Indies have lost to Australia, New Zealand, Sri Lanka and South Africa, an the margins of defeat - 103 runs, seven wickets, 113 runs, and by 67 runs with South Africa easing up - have been huge the West Indies are ranked at number eight and Bangladesh just one below at number nine, those embarrassments would be nothing compared to what it would be if the Windies, the once mighty Windies, were to lose to Bangladesh.

As bad as the West Indies have been playing, however, that should not happen - not only because the West Indies have won one of the two meetings between the teams in the World Cup with one, the last one in 2003, ending in a no result, and not only because in terms of matches played in the Cup, the West Indies with 34 victories and 20 losses, have a better record than Bangladesh who have won only six while losing 12.

Punch-drunk

Unless they are really punch-drunk, unless things are really so bad in the camp that they have lost all their pride, the West Indies should not lose to Bangladesh for the simple reason that in Christopher Gayle and Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Devon Smith, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Marlon Samuels and captain Brian Lara, in Daren Powell, Ian Bradshaw, Corey Collymore and Jerome Taylor - the best of them - they possess batsmen and bowlers who should be too good for Bangladesh.

On top of that, the pitch at Kensington Oval, a pitch of pace and bounce, should be right up the West Indies street.

Although the odds must be in the West Indies' favour, they cannot, however, afford to take Bangladesh for granted - not if they remember their embarrassment in 1996 when Kenya clobbered them by 73 runs and not if they remember that Bangladesh knocked off Pakistan in 1999. Also, that in this tournament Bangladesh sent India home after the first round, surprised South Africa, and after scoring 143 right here at Kensington Oval six days ago, had England fighting for their lives before Michael Vaughan's frightened men scrambled to victory.

The danger men in the Bangladesh line-up are batsmen Saqibul Hasan, Mohammad Ashraful, Tamim Iqbal, Aftab Ahmed, and captain Habibul Bashar, and not so much seamers Shahadat Hossain and Mashrafe Mortaza, but more so their three left-arm spin bowlers - Abdur Razzaq, Mohammad Rafique and all-rounder Hasan.

Right now, Ireland, Bangladesh - with only today's match to come - and the West Indies with today's and Saturday's matches to go, are tied at the bottom of the standings on two points each. The West Indies are the only team still to win a match in the second round of the tournament. Time is running out on them, an it is against Bangladesh, even though it should not be, this could be the day of reckoning.