TRINBAGO KNIGHT RIDERS’ (TKR) batting woes continued yesterday as they suffered their second straight defeat, this time to Jamaica Tallawahs when the Hero Caribbean Premier League (CPL) 2022 T20 series continued at the Daren Sammy National Cricket Stadium in St Lucia. yesterday.
It was Tallawahs’ third win of the campaign, with their captain Rovman Powell (69 – 49 balls, six fours, four sixes) combining with Raymond Reifer for a 90-run partnership that helped set up a winning total of 153 for seven.
Man of the match Imad Wasim then contributed 21 off 12 balls (three fours, one six) to help propel the Jamaican franchise to their final total and then produced bowling figures of two for 21 to force their submission TKR shocks.
“It was a good wicket to play on. We played really well to get to 154. They have a star-studded line-up but we came out really well and we had a plan,” Wasim said afterwards in a TV interview. “The first batting, it was sticky at first. The target our goal was to score 140+. This win against one of the top teams will give us a lot of confidence.”
TKR did not play like the top dogs.
After Ravi Rampaul (three for 40) did his bit to give TKR a fighting chance – including removing the opening pair of Kennar Lewis (four) and Brandon King (seven), plus Wasim towards the end – the TKR batsmen again let them down.the team.
The pinch-hitting experiment with Sunil Narine (zero) produced his third successive failure when the left-hander was bowled by pacer Mohammad Amir (two for 15). Tion Webster (five) then fell victim to a misfire engineered by Wasim in a spell of play in which Colin Munro (29) tried to stabilize the innings.
However, TKR was unable to find any fluidity thereafter.
A scraping shot from Tim Seifert (15) ended when Tallawahs off-spinner Chris Green got him to chase a wide delivery and wicketkeeper Amir Jangoo caught it off the ground and finished the shot.
Nicholas Pooran’s (13) struggles with the bat continued when Amir struck him. These were two of the five wickets lost in the space of 32 runs and 4.4 overs.
TKR captain Kieron Pollard (six) and Andre Russell (17) followed, while Rampaul (two) was the last wicket to fall as TKR stumbled to 119 for eight when time ran out.
The loss left the four-time champions fourth in the table with three points, above last year’s losing finalists St Lucia Kings with two points and Guyana Amazon Warriors with a single point. TKR now head home for the Trinidad and Tobago matches, hoping the home support will spur an improved performance.
