The Guyana Amazon Warriors (GAW) won a 35-run victory over the Saint Lucia Kings (SLK) in the twenty-ninth CPL match on Saturday, 28th September 2024. A strong Batting performance led by Shai Hope and Shimron Hetmyer secured Guyana Amazon Warrior’s top spot on the table.
The cricket fans witnessed another exciting Caribbean Premier League T20 match at Providence Stadium, Guyana. Observing the previous match played on this ground the pitch here at this venue tends to be good for batting. The track is slower than the others, but it helps the spinners perform well.
GAW won the toss and chose to bat first. GAW had an aggressive batting performance, and both the openers started to settle, with Azam Khan smashing 26 of 11 deliveries with three boundaries and Rahmanullah Gurbaz with a score of 29 of 26 deliveries.
SLK bowler Motie stops the play by taking out Azam Khan. GAW sends the number third batsman, Shai Hope, to the crease. A second shock for Gaw was when Rahmanullah Gurbaz lost his wicket in the powerplay to Joseph b Wiese.
GAW batsmen Hetmyer and Hope had a great season with a remarkable run rate, and they became the biggest obstacle for SLK to win this match. While Hetmer started playing aggressively with smashing boundaries, Hope made a slow start.
Hetmyer ensured that Guyana scored as much as possible in the powerplay by scoring 58 off 30 deliveries with 9 four boundaries and a six before losing his wicket to SLK bowler Joseph.
Hope was now well-grounded on the crease and smashed three sixes against Khary Pierre with a total score of 56 of 31 deliveries and left GAW with a total score of 207-7.
Saint Lucia Kings hunting for a 208 score seems tough to achieve, seeing the GAW bowling lineup. Coming to bat, Captain Du Plessis, the crowd saw an outstanding performance by him. He struggled with Battling cramps and a hamstring issue but showed a class batting , smashing sixes and keeping SLK’s hopes alive, marking him as one of the finest T20 players.
But SLK lost the momentum soon after Johnson Charles lost his wicket to Motie with a total score of 12 runs. SLK lost Roston Chase’s important wicket to Imran Tahir in the Seventh over, making GAW take control of the match.
Despite losing wickets to the spin trio of Tahir, Moeen Ali, and Gudakesh Motie and limiting the SLK to 101 for six wickets, captain Du Plessis fought alone. While Saint Lucia had made only 121 from 17 overs, The best moment of du Plessis was in the 19th over when he swept Sinclair for three sixes.
Plessis had an outstanding half-century with a total score of 92 off 34 deliveries, but ultimately, they lost the match with a margin of 35 runs.
