BRIS­BANE–West In­dies coach David Williams has set high ex­pec­ta­tions for his side ahead of the first Test against Aus­tralia and says team work will be the key to their first se­ries win in 15 years against the hosts.

"We have come to­geth­er here as a team and the team spir­it is very good. Even be­fore we left the Caribbean we knew what to ex­pect and we had dis­cus­sions which out­lined what would be re­quired," Williams said yes­ter­day morn­ing fol­low­ing a train­ing ses­sion at Al­lan Bor­der Field. "Aus­tralia is a tough place to play crick­et for vis­it­ing teams and we know we have to work hard and work for each oth­er. We have no prob­lems at all. "At the end of the day we are look­ing for good per­for­mances and look­ing to beat the Aus­tralians." West In­dies have en­joyed a rel­a­tive­ly smooth build up to the open­ing Test of the three-match se­ries, which starts tonight. They drew their four-day warm up match against Queens­land Bulls last week where the ex­pe­ri­enced bat­ting duo of Ramnaresh Sar­wan and Shiv­nar­ine Chan­der­paul, along with the rook­ie open­ing pair of Adri­an Barath and Travis Dowl­in, all got half-cen­turies. West In­dies' bowl­ing re­mains a con­cern, how­ev­er, as ex­posed by Queens­land who piled up 617 for sev­en, with three bats­men scor­ing maid­en first class cen­turies.

Williams said they were look­ing to ex­pe­ri­enced fast bowler Jerome Tay­lor to lead the at­tack, es­pe­cial­ly with sev­er­al untest­ed play­ers in the line up. "We have a new-look bowl­ing at­tack, and with Jerome Tay­lor as the spear­head and we know he can be a hand­ful," said Williams who was a mem­ber of the last West In­dies team to beat the Aussies in a se­ries. "The bowlers know what is ex­pect­ed and this se­ries is a chance to make a name for them­selves. We are tak­ing it one step at a time. We have made our plans and we know the ar­eas we have to work on and cap­i­talise when we get in win­ning po­si­tions." Williams, who played 11 Tests, said he was ex­treme­ly pleased with how the team had gelled and re­spond­ed in train­ing, and stressed every­thing was point­ing to a well-oiled unit for the first Test at the Gab­ba. "There have been many pos­i­tive signs and we are re­al­ly ex­cit­ed go­ing in­to the Test se­ries," said the T&T na­tive. "We have a cou­ple of days to go and an­oth­er prac­tice ses­sion to­mor­row (last night). We have to look at the pitch and see how it plays be­fore we make any de­ci­sions. "I am pleased with the work eth­ic of all the play­ers and we the con­tri­bu­tions they have been mak­ing."(CMC)

Teams

West In­dies squad:

Chris Gayle (capt), Adri­an Barath, Sulie­man Benn, Dwayne Bra­vo, Shiv­nar­ine Chan­der­paul, Nars­ingh De­onar­ine, Travis Dowl­in, Bren­dan Nash, De­nesh Ramdin (wk), Ravi Ram­paul, Ke­mar Roach, Dar­ren Sam­my, Ramnaresh Sar­wan, Jerome Tay­lor, Gavin Tonge.

Aus­tralia:

Si­mon Katich, Shane Wat­son, Ricky Ponting (capt), Michael Hussey, Michael Clarke, Mar­cus North, Brad Haddin (wk), Mitchell John­son, Nathan Hau­ritz, Pe­ter Sid­dle, Ben Hil­fen­haus and Doug Bollinger.