BRIDGETOWN, Barbados (CMC):

WEST INDIES captain Ramnaresh Sarwan has blamed the team's lack of preparation for their dismal showing at the Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa.

"It must be the way we fielded and bowled. I think it had to do with the lack of preparation on our behalf as well," Sarwan told reporters here after he arrived from London en route to Guyana last week.

"We can only blame a lot of things about our fielding, batting and bowling, but I think the players have got to be responsible to actually try and make the effort to do the hard work to perform at the best level that they can.

"It's the best possible team we had picked to tour South Africa for the Twenty20. I don't think we can complain or blame anyone, but ourselves. We are not going to make any excuses so it's just a matter of lacking of preparation that cost us."

lost both matches

The West Indies lost both matches in the preliminary round to make an early exit from the inaugural tournament.

They lost to South Africa by eight wickets in the curtain-raising match despite a sizzling century from opener Chris Gayle, and were then upset by Bangladesh by six wickets in their second match.

Sarwan, who was playing his first tournament since returning injured from the summer tour of England, said the disappointing campaign had underscored the value of proper preparation.

"What we have learnt for sure is that it shows how important it is to prepare ourselves and prepare properly," the 27-year-old said.

"I thought we played very well in England and to take that same sort of momentum to South Africa would have been really good but, unfortunately, that didn't happen. "I thought the reason we played so well in England was because we played quite a few games leading up to the one-day and Twenty20 tournament and, unfortunately, it was the total opposite going into the Twenty20 World Cup where we didn't play too many games and it shows how important preparation is."

He continued: "It was a disappointment. Obviously we wanted to get into the Super Eights but, unfortunately that didn't happen. Everyone is disappointed. To have travelled so far and then to lose in the preliminaries is hard to take.

"Nevertheless, we've got a couple weeks to get ourselves prepared for the KFC Cup and then get ourselves ready for Zimbabwe and South Africa."