Saint Lucia Kings continue their fine form, especially in the bowling department. We cruised to the finish line with a 54-run win.
After losing his first toss of the tournament, Faf du Plessis and his men were put in to bat first by Kieron Pollard’s Trinbago Knight Riders. Faf made it clear that he wanted to bowl first as well, with the wicket and the outfield consisting of a lot of moisture.
As usual, it was the duo of du Plessis and Johnson Charles who opened the innings for us. A slow start followed by some brilliant new-ball bowling by the Knight Riders. It was just a matter of time before our batters got used to the new ball and our captain led from the front.
Faf opened the floodgates for us with some beautifully carved-out boundaries. In the 5th over though we managed to dodge a bullet when Johnson Charles was given LBW, but after reviewing it, the decision was reversed.
Charles was given consecutive lifelines after he was dropped yet again in the eighth over by Sunil Narine. The Saint Lucia born batter took his chances with both hands and capitalized on the opportunity with some big shots. Du Plessis meanwhile continued with his own onslaught on the other end and reached his half-century in no time inside the ninth over.
However, Pollard brought on Andre Russell in the 10th over to try and break the opening partnership, and so he did. The tall all-rounder dismissed our skipper with a short ball that he edged to the short third man and made the walk back to the pavilion after a well-played innings of 57 from 36 balls.
Charles continued with his counter-attack after his captain's dismissal but unfortunately wasn’t a third time lucky after he fell prey to yet another Andre Russell delivery. Sikandar Raza and Bhanuka Rajapaksa entered the crease and looked to up the ante.
Raza, who had a slow start to life at CPL, was smashing boundaries for fun. Rajapaksa however, struggled for momentum on the other end. Veteran all-rounder Dwayne Bravo picked up the wicket of Raza late in the innings in the 19th over, who played a brilliant knock of 32 from 23 balls.
Bravo continued with his excellent death bowling and picked up the wicket of Rajapaksa, a ball after Raza was dismissed. Our leading run scorer for this season - Sean Williams just got to face the last ball of the innings and made full use of it by smashing it for a boundary.
After putting up a more than decent total on the board for the Knight Riders to chase, it was the turn of our in-form bowling lineup to take centre stage. Mark Deyal and Martin Guptill got our opponents off to a flying start. Deyal in particular was smashing boundaries at ease.
It wasn’t until the penultimate ball of the third over that we clawed our way back into the game. Pierre picked up the wicket of Guptill after the Kiwi mistimed his shot and was gone for just seven. Two successive wickets of Walton and Pooran followed and suddenly the Knight Riders were reeling for stability in the powerplay after both the batters were dismissed for ducks.
Kieron Pollard and Mark Deyal built up a solid partnership, where Pollard pitched in with much-needed boundaries for his team. The Knight Riders skipper was controlling the innings for them until Raza was given the ball and he outwitted the former West Indies captain.
After Pollard’s wicket, it all went downhill from there for his team at 82 for 4. Raza and Chase picked up a couple of wickets between them and Khary Piere made sure he took care of the tail-enders. Trinbago Knight Riders were bowled out for 113 inside 15 overs and sent us to the top of the CPL table. Next up for us is a game against Barbados Royals next weekend.
