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Carl Hooper has urged his West Indies players to dig deep to find the reserves needed for the upcoming back-to-back Tests against New Zealand that complete the longest international home season in history.

We've been on the go since January so it's been tough for us but we can see a little light at the end of the tunnel, the captain observed after the West Indies clinched the One-Day series 3-1 with their tense, last-ball victory in the fifth and final match in St Vincent on Sunday.

We've got another two weeks of hard cricket with two Test matches so we've got to really dig deep to play good cricket and compete with the New Zealand side, he added.

Only twice in the past have Tests gone into June in 1955 when the last Test against Australia finished on June 17, and in 1997 when Sri Lanka ended their two-match series June 24. The final Test against New Zealand in Grenada is scheduled June 28-July 3.

Sunday's remarkable triumph, when the West Indies scored more than they have ever done to win a One-Day International, 292 for six, should act as a psychological antidote to the physical pressure of non-stop cricket over the past four-and-a-half months.

Since January 31, the West Indies have played seven Tests (two against Pakistan in Sharjah and five against India at home) and ten One-Day Internationals (three in Sharjah and three against India and five against New Zealand at home).

Hooper, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Chris Gayle have played in all, fast bowlers Merv Dillon and Cameron Cuffy have missed only one One-Day International each. In addition, Hooper and Chanderpaul turned out in five Busta Cup matches for Guyana.

Both teams arrived in Barbados yesterday to prepare for the first Test, starting at Kensington Oval on Friday and the West Indies were showing the strain of their exhausting schedule.

Both Chanderpaul, the season's leading batsman, and Merv Dillon, their bowling spearhead, are nursing injuries that require fitness tests before they are given the all-clear for Friday.

Chanderpaul, Sunday's hero with three successive boundaries and a single off the last four balls that clinched the win, has a painful left funny bone where he was struck by a ball from fast bowler Shane Bond that forced him to retire early in the innings.

A preliminary X-ray in St Vincent showed no bone damage, only bruising, but the negatives were sent to Barbados for a second opinion.

Dillon has rested a lower back strain for the past week on doctor's orders, missing Sunday's match.

In addition, Brian Lara's left elbow, dislocated and fractured in an on-field collision during a One-Day International in Sri Lanka last December, is still not fully recovered while Cuffy and others have looked increasingly weary.

Dillon's workload since the Sharjah series has been 440.4 overs in Tests and One-Day Internationals. Cuffy, at 32 the oldest bowler in the team, has had 367.

In contrast, the New Zealanders, on their fourth tour of the Caribbean, are relatively fresh. If anything, they are short of match preparation.

A terrorist bomb blast outside their hotel in Karachi caused the second of two Tests against Pakistan to be abandoned May 8. Their only matches have been the five One-Day Internationals here and a warm-up against the University of the West Indies Vice-Chancellor's XI.

Practice sessions have been hampered by wet weather everywhere they have gone so far and there was more of the same when they got into Barbados yesterday evening.

They have made several changes to their team for the Tests.

Opening batsmen Mark Richardson and Matt Horne, fast bowler Chris Martin and wicket-keeper Robbie Hart are coming in to replace medium-pacers Paul Hitchcock and Jacob Oram, wicket-keeper Chris Nevin and left-arm spinner Matthew Hart.

© The Barbados Nation