Inconsistency and atrocious batting in final cost Jaguars NAGICO Super 50 title

Jan 29, 2015 Sports

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By Sean Devers
Like in the CPL final last year when Guyana were trashed by the Trinidad & Tobago Red Steel, they again saved their worse for last and were soundly

beaten by 135 runs in the 2015 NAGICO Super50 cricket tournament by T&T’s Red Force after being spun out for their lowest ever 50 over total of 65 in 23.5 overs.
From 36 without loss the crumbled as Sunil Narine spun webs around the Jaguars batsmen who looked totally bamboozled by his mesmerizing off-spin on a spin friendly Queens Park Oval pitch last Sunday night as the 26-year-old had 6-9 from eight overs.
The Oval was used in six zone matches in as many days with a day’s break before the semis were played on consecutive days. After another day’s break, the Final was played with the Jaguars having all of their five games at the only International cricket venue in Trinidad. The ground staff did a commendable job in delivering reasonable good pitches in the limited preparation time available.
While the Oval is one of the best drying grounds in the Carribean, the same cannot be said for the National Cricket Centre in Couva where only one of the three scheduled matches there was played, or Shaw Park in Tobago where a wet outfield reduced the match there between Red Force and the West Indies under-19s to a 21 overs affair.
The facilities and drainage at Couva were sub standard for such a tournament and UWI ground which also has lights and has one the better outfields in Trinidad would have been a better option, while tiny Shaw Park ground also took a long time to dry. The overall standard of Umpiring left a lot to be desired and with

TV exposing their shortcomings and several questionably decisions were made.
While Jason Mohamed (117*) scored the only century at the Oval in the final, the other two centuries were scored at Couva where Rakeem Cornwell hit 113 for the Leewards and in Tobago where Johnson Charles hammered a record 177 for the Windwards, who made the second highest total since the tournament was first played in 1976. They amassed 374-6 against defending champs Barbados. T&T’s 409-6 against Northern Windwards in 2001 is the highest total at this level of Regional cricket.
Apart from Charles, Windwards opener Dawnley Joseph (153) and Guyana’s Clayton Lambert (151*) have made more than 150 in an innings in this tournament.
This is the middle of the Carnival season and there was very little promotion of the competition while no Trinidad & Tobago Radio station carried any of the games before the final, even those involving the home team. The Carribean Super Station carried every game on Radio, while ESPN carried all of the games at the Oval live.
Not many people attended the zone matches but the final attracted an almost full house and created a fantastic atmosphere. However, the pathetic Jaguars batting and faulty catching left even Trini supports, who had come to see a riveting contest, disappointed. Singh, fielding at square-leg (as sub) should be commended for taking the catch of match; diving full length to his left to hold a stunner to dismiss Darren Bravo.
The pitches, especially at the Queens Park Oval where all the games were played under lights, got slower

and lower as the tournament progressed and contributed to only two totals above 200 in eight matches there.
The overall batting was sub standard and several impetuous shots caused the batsmen’s demise, none more shocking than the reverse sweep by the usually level-headed Singh after he had played four similar shots without success.
Charles was the only batsman to pass 200 (203) while Chanderpaul’s 198 runs from five innings was next but his strike rate of 56 and never suggested he was willing to counter-attack the bowlers and stamp his authority as a West Indies player.
The strange shuffling of the batting order and baffling bowling changes especially in the Jaguars only loss against CCC when Reifer was amazingly asked to bowl the final over instead Paul Wintz, although Reifer’s only over in the tournament cost 10 runs and included two wides, were big tactical blunders.
Apart from Chanderpaul none of the batsmen in the tournament seemed capable of batting for any length of time without doing something stupid in a tournament which was dominated by bowlers.
The Jaguars were handicapped before a ball was bowled when Jonathon Foo, back in the national set up for the first time since 2010 , was infected with the ‘Flu’ and did not play a single match resulting in Singh (lucky to be in the squad instead of Ricardo Adams or Robin Bacchus) making his One-Day debut. He was dropped after one game for scoring too slowly when he made 49 from 99 balls.
Inconsistent batting let the Jaguars down throughout the tournament with no two batsman

scoring over 50 together in any of the same matches. Chanderpaul’s unbeaten 98, when he batted from start to finish in the semi-finals, Barbadian Raymond Reifer’s undefeated 84 against his countrymen and Rajendra Chandrika’s 52 against the Windward’s, were the only Jaguars’ batsmen to score a fifty in the five matches.
Trevon Griffith failed at the top of the order before flattering to deceive in finals with a cameo 31 with six boundaries before he pushed forward to one that spun prodigiously and edged it to slip off Narine to trigger a disgraceful batting collapse as the Jaguars lost all 10 of their wickets for 31 runs with nobody else getting into double figures.
The bright side for the Jaguars was their bowling. Only Narine (12) took more wickets than Veerasammy Permaul (11), while T&T’s Dwayne Bravo and the Jaguars’ Devendra Bishoo had eight each. Ronsford Beaton seemed not at his strongest and had a tough tournament, while Wintz bowled beautifully until his last two overs of the competition cost 30 runs. Barnwell, like Wintz had four wickets and also did a decent job with the ball for Guyana.
Steven Jacobs, who failed with the bat, was excellent with the new ball, extracting plenty of bounce and turn with his frugal off-spin, while Crandon also offered good support with his off-spin to spin twins Bishoo and Permaul who both contributed vital runs down the order. Anthony Bramble was awarded the best wicket-keeper in the tournament and scored a quick-fire unbeaten 43 in the opening game but proved inconsistent with the bat in the remaining games.
The bowlers were the ones who impressed with Ryad Emrit, Narine and seven-foot pacer Christopher Powell from CCC (one of the ‘finds’ of the tournament) were the only bowlers with 5-wicket hauls.
Nikita Miller, Damian Jacobs, Keron Cottoy and Rakeem Cornwall (who also batted positively) all bowled well on the spin friendly pitches but big name players like Kieron Pollard, the Bravo siblings failed to fire with the bat.
The Guyanese pair of Shemron Hetmyer and Taignarine Chanderpaul batted well for the West Indies under-19s and should stake strong claims for selection on the Jaguars Four-Day team when that version of the franchise cricket resumes with sixth round matches next month.
But if the performances in this tournament was intended to inspire hopes of a revival of West Indies cricket it did not fulfill those expectations.

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