Warriors’ bowlers hold off St. Lucia Stars in nail-biting finish to win
DPI, Guyana, Saturday, 11 August 2018
The bowling prowess of the Guyana Amazon Warriors held off a desperate St. Lucia Stars team, to preserve their unbeaten start to 2018 Caribbean Premier League (CPL) in a nail-biting finish. They defeated the St. Lucian team by three runs in the last over in front of capacity crowd at the National Stadium, Providence.
The Warriors were sent in to bat and made 141 runs for the loss of four wickets in their 20 overs. Making the bulk of the score was Luke Ronchi with 41, Chadwick Walton 31 and Shimron Hetmyer with 21. In defending the low total, it was the bowlers who stepped up to the plate and inflicted damage on an already wounded St. Lucian team.
The seam bowling of Sohail Tanveer and spin of Christopher Green held the Stars opening pair of Andre Fletcher and David Warner to a slow run rate that saw them making just a total of 25 in the first five overs. However, it was Imran Tahir who got the breakthrough in the seventh over to end the 29-run partnership with the wicket of Warner. Just two balls later, he bagged the wicket of Fletcher.
With two new batsmen, Kieron Pollard and Lendl Simmons, to the crease, pressure began to mount on the St. Lucian team. At the end of the 10th over, they managed to scrape only 50 runs with the loss of two wickets. However, untidy fielding by the Warriors helped the pair to build momentum with Simmons being dropped in the 16th over by Sherfane Rutherford.
Nevertheless, in the third ball of the 17th over, Man of the Match, Rayad Emrit got the wicket of Simmons when he edged the ball to the wicketkeeper. Until then, Simmons was becoming a force to be reckoned with, having scored 45 runs. Mark Chapman who replaced Simmons made just two runs before being stumped off the bowling of Chris Green which left them wanting 23 runs at the end of the 18th over to win the game.
With Pollard being the only real threat left to the Warriors, Emrit would strike again in the 19th over picking up the wickets of Pollard and Rahkeem Cornwall which placed him on a hat-trick.
The total of 16 runs was needed in the final over to win but it was Keemo Paul who held his nerve bowling the last over, rattling the stumps of Kavem Hodge with his first ball. Despite being hit for a huge six with his second ball by Mitchell McClenaghan, Paul held his nerves and bowled to perfection giving the Warriors their victory.
The Warriors now sit on top of the points table with two solid wins and four points ahead of Trinbago Knight Riders and the Jamaica Tallawahs. The Warriors will face the Barbados Tridents tomorrow at the National Stadium.
By: Isaiah Braithwaite
Images: Keno George and Kawise Wishart