Dyson and West Indies frustrated by rain

With just nine days until the first Test against England, John Dyson, the West Indies coach, has rued his side's poor performance after their match against Essex was washed out due to rain. Essex closed the second day on 175 for 3, leading by 292, but not a single ball was bowled on the third and final day.

"I thought we batted poorly except for Shiv," Dyson told PA. "He just bats and bats "The other batsmen are very inexperienced in these sorts of conditions and they wasted their opportunity here to get some good time in the middle. They have hopefully learned a good lesson here about how to handle these conditions.

"Our bowlers have all bowled some reasonable spells and it is just a matter of consistency throughout the total innings which they need to work on."

However, Dyson welcomed the news that Jerome Taylor would return in time for the first Test, following his recovery from a hip injury. "We expect him to be fully fit," Dyson said. "The reports from the West Indies say that and we expect him to play at Derby."

Taylor will be joined by Fidel Edwards, who arrives on Sunday after his spell in the Indian Premier League, but that still leaves one unfilled spot.

"Lionel Baker bowled some good spells in this match," said Dyson. "He bowled at other times not so well. He still has a bit of work to do but he knows that. He is still in pole position as he is the man in possession and one of the others would have to do something brilliant to knock him out."

West Indies have one final warm-up game ahead of the first Test, against a strong England Lions team captained by Rob Key, featuring Ian Bell, Saj Mahmood and the young Warwickshire seamer, Chris Woakes.

"It is very unusual these days to go into a Test series with so many games under your belt," Dyson said. "It is nice for us seeing as we have a group of younger players with us from the Caribbean. "It gives us a chance to see them out of their home conditions."