The Malteenoes All Stars, the lone Guyanese team participating in the 2020 UWI-Unicom Twenty20 tournament, had their dream run come to an end when they went down by 55 runs to the Queen’s Park Cricket Club (QPCC) in a semi-final match of this tournament, played at the UWI Spec ground in Trinidad and Tobago.
The Malteenoes All Stars
The All Stars won the toss and elected to bowl first, having been more successful at chasing targets than setting same in this tournament. However, things fell apart when they found a minor target of 161 unattainable.
Confident as always, the Queen’s Park Cricket Club were able to make good use of the ‘power play’ overs, with Tion Webster digging deep and scoring a handy 37 off 26 balls, and the team receiving able support from Nicholas Alexis with 35 and Justin Guillen with 25.
Bowling for the Malteenoes All Stars, Anthony Adams took 3-34 and Quintin Sampson 2-31.
Needing 161 to win, the Guyanese side crumbled under pressure and were bowled out for 105 in 17.1 overs. Hard pressed, they abandoned their usual flamboyant batting style as they lost wickets at important moments, and just could not hold a partnership together.
Trevon Griffith top scored for the All Stars with 23 runs off 12 deliveries, and Raj Nannan chipped in with 17.
The Queen’s Park Club destroyers were Christopher Vincent, who bagged 4-25; Jon Rus Jaggessar, who bagged 3-21; and Dexter Sween, who took 2-36.
All Stars coach Darien Best said after the match: “We batted terribly tonight! Irresponsibly! (We) lost wickets in bunches, and couldn’t string together a partnership! 160 is a paltry score, and we felt we should’ve chased that comfortably! Up until this game, we played, well, as a unit…
“Young Sampson was somewhat of a revelation, and I could see big things in store for him in the future. Nannan had a good all-round season, and I hope national selectors give him a look sometime.”
For progressing to the semi-finals of this tournament, the All Stars earned themselves TT$4000.
