Hero Caribbean Premier League 2016…
… despite Munro marvelous century
By John Ramsingh in Port of Spain
The drama of the Hero Caribbean Premier League (CPL) continued last night at the Queen’s Park Oval with a
convincing six-wicket victory for the Guyana Amazon Warriors against their inconsistent hosts despite a commanding unbeaten century from Colin Munro.
The Warriors were asked to make 163 to beat the Trinbago Knight Riders and to register their second consecutive victory on the road and got home with four balls to spare with Christopher Lynn blazing the trail to an aggressive match winning half century.
When Lynn was out leg before wicket to Dwayne Bravo (2/34) the score was 155/3 in the 19th over and only eight runs were required for victory. The winning runs came off the second ball of the final over when Jason Mohammed hit Ronsford Beaton over the cover boundary for 6 to seal the win. Mohammed finished on 33 not out from 30 balls (2×4; 1×6). Lynn batted with purpose to upstage the home team with another capacity crowd at the Queen’s Park Oval. He got to his half century from 30 balls with five 6’s and one other boundary. He was eventually out for 77 from 43 balls (1×4;8×6) and got great support from the Warriors top order with captain Martin Guptil making 26 and his opening partner Dwayne Smith getting 25. Christopher Barnwell failed again with the bat and did not bowl for the second straight match.
The game started when the Trinbago Knight Riders were sent in on another good track on a slightly heavy outfield and were once again pegged back very early but was rescued by Colin Munro.
The New Zealander Munro came to the crease to face the second ball of the match after his countryman Brendon Mc Cullum edged the first ball of the match from Sohail Tanvir behind. And was the case with the TKR in their previous two matches they were rebuilding after losing early wickets.
In the fifth over Hashim Amla played back to Veerasammy Permaul (26/1) and was bowled for 6 (10 balls) before Munro and Darren Bravo (12) added 74 for the third wicket before Adam Zampa got Barvo to hit a googly to deep mid-wicket. At the other end Munro was blazing away to past his previous best T20 score of 89 on his way to his maiden T20 century. He got to 50 from 34 balls and to three figures from 64 balls (7×4; 6×6). The innings ended shortly after that with the Kiwi not out on an even hundred from 66 balls and the hosts 162/5. Dwayne Bravo made 18 from 17 balls and Kevon Cooper had a late charge with 16 from 9 balls while Umar Akmal failed again.
Tanvir was the leader of the Warriors attack again with 2 for 21 while Zampa, Rayad Emrit and Permaul picked up one wicket each.
With a sketchy series of home matches in the opening leg the Trinbago Knight Riders will now turn their attention to the Jamaica Tallawahs who beat the St. Kitts and Nevis Patriots in their opening fixture at Warner Park also on Saturday.
The game against the Tallawahs is the Knight Riders final home match and it is set for Monday at the Queen’s Park Oval at 19:00 Hrs.
While the Amazon Warriors will now put their away matches on hold as they travel to the South American mainland for four matches in Guyana beginning next Thursday against the Jamaica Tallawahs.