A comprehensive victory by the Guyana Jaguars over the Windward Islands Volcanoes on Easter Monday at Providence have given the Jaguars an unassailable lead in the points standings and the Digicel Regional 4-Day title for the third straight year.
Keemo Paul
The hosts needed only 45 minutes on day three to take the final five Volcanoes wickets for the massive win by an innings and 122 runs with more than a day and two sessions to spare.
The visitors needed a monumental effort from their lower order to make a contest of the 10th round match and with international player Devon Smith unbeaten on his 54th half century, there was a slight hope of pushing the game deep into the penultimate day at least.
The Volcanoes resumed on 102-5 with Smith on 60 and Kyle Mayers one but their stay in the middle was very short. In beautiful weather, Mayers took 13 runs off the first over of the day which was bowled by left-arm spinner Gudakesh Motie from the Players Pavilion End including a six over long-off and a cover drive for four.
Mayers played one shot too many and in the next over, the second of the day he edged a short ball from Keemo Paul to Assad Fudadin who dived forward to claim his prize, however the batsman stayed his ground. After consulting with Umpire Zahid Bassarath at square-leg, Mayers was subsequently given out by Umpire Shannon Crawford to give Paul his first wicket in the second innings in his first over of the day.
Next in was Shane Shillingford who continued the assault on Motie taking 11 off of the next over including a six and a four. However, after a quiet period Smith was also undone by the fired up Paul in the next over. The Grenadian got a short slower ball from Paul and was in the shot too early as the ball took the leading edge and flew to gully and into the waiting hands of Rajendra Chandrika. Smith gone and the Jaguars’ celebration had begun.
Larry Edward joined Shillingford and after blocking out a maiden from Paul drove hard back to Motie who held on to the sharp chance and all of a sudden in the day’s seventh over the visitors were 136-8. The tall rangy figure of Delorn Johnson then drove the next ball straight back to Motie who took it inches from the ground diving to his right and was on a hat trick with last man Sherman Lewis walking out. The hat trick was averted and Shillingford took the attack to the young Jaguars bowlers in the next two overs before Paul had the last laugh when Lewis was adjudged LBW at the start of the 47th over of the innings.
Shillingford was left uneaten on 35 which came off of 24 balls with five fours and two sixes when he ran out of partners.
Motie who picked up two wickets just before stumps on day 2 for just three runs from four overs had a contrasting spell on day three where he went for 42 runs from five overs while picking up his two scalps to finish as the pick of the Jaguars bowlers with 4-45 while Paul took 3-36 to finish with match figures of 9-64 following his 6-28 in the first innings.
The champions took 21.6 points from the match to hold on to the Headley/Weekes trophy the prize for Regional Four -Day supremacy.
The Jaguars still have a match in hand and will take on the Leeward Islands Hurricanes beginning on Friday at the Guyana National Stadium, Providence.
