It will be a poignant moment when Devendra Bishoo steps out onto the turf at the Guyana National Stadium on Thursday for the fifth one-dayer against Pakistan. The legspinner Bishoo, 25, has been the find of the series for West Indies, and fittingly he'll finish the one-day portion of his breakthrough series on his home ground, for the first time in a West Indies shirt.
"I am really excited about playing for West Indies in my own country for the first time," Bishoo said. "For me personally, it will be a good way to end the ODI series. There's no place like home, and my mother will be there. This will be her first time seeing me play for West Indies.
"I don't have any brothers or sisters, and my dad passed away when I was only eight years old so it is just me and her. I know she is so proud of me and it will be really special for her to see me play at home."
The leading wicket-taker during the series, Bishoo has 10 victims at 16.30, and has shown composure under pressure and mastery of flight. He picked up three important wickets in the victory in Barbados, West Indies' only win of the series, and most impressively, deceived the centurion Mohammad Hafeez in the process.
"I have heard that the commentators are saying that I show no fear and that I am not afraid to bowl to anyone," Bishoo said. "That's true. I'm not. I believe in myself 100%. I stick to the basics, and go out there and do what I do best. I've been playing cricket since I was 11 and the secret is simple: never stop training. The way I look at it, there are no holidays in cricket. I never stop training ... rain or shine, I'm playing cricket."
Bishoo debuted during the World Cup and was one of the few positives to come out of the tournament for West Indies. He is keen to help his team to a respectable 3-2 series result before the Test portion of Pakistan's visit begins next week.
The hosts have named an unchanged 13-man squad for the final one-dayer in Guyana. The captain, Darren Sammy, hopes that his men can take some momentum from the victory in Bridgetown.
"We did well in Barbados to win a close match, after we fell 3-0 down in the series," Sammy said. "What we are looking for is a win tomorrow [Thursday] to finish off and carry the momentum into the two Test matches to follow.
"We did some really good things in the last match. The bowlers have been excellent for us - they did really well in the World Cup and also in the T20 International and the first four matches of this series. Devendra Bishoo has been amazing since he came into the team and Ravi Rampaul has taken his chance with both hands.
"The batsmen did the job in the last match and that was very good to see. We were set a challenging target and we chased it down. We had some really good batting at the top and we always had the belief we would pull it off. We held our nerve to pull one back in the series. Now we will look to put in another good showing and get another win on the board."
West Indies squad: Lendl Simmons, Kirk Edwards, Darren Bravo, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Marlon Samuels, Dwayne Bravo, Darren Sammy (capt), Carlton Baugh (wk), Anthony Martin, Andre Rusell, Kemar Roach, Devendra Bishoo, Ravi Rampaul.