Intermittent rainfall yesterday denied Guyana the opportunity to record their first win of West Indies Cricket Board’s the regional four day cricket tournament against Trinidad and Tobago at the Providence National Stadium, the match ending in a damp draw.
Yesterday’s final day of a seemingly balanced seventh round encounter against the team from the twin-island republic saw the Trinidadians walking away with first innings points only which allowed defending champions Barbados to retain their title in this year’s West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) Regional 4-day tournament.
Trinidad went into the match on 72 points and needing to defeat the Guyanese outright to acquire the 12 points needed to effectively topple Barbados but because of the drawn result, the Trinidadians only received 8 points; 3 for the draw, 3 for bowling and 2 for batting taking their total to 80 points.
Resuming on an overnight score of 17 for 1 chasing 208 for a pride restoring victory, early morning showers first stopped played for approximately an hour before returning in a more devastating fashion after the lunch session with the home side 80 for the loss of three wickets in 40 overs, trailing by a deficit of 128-runs.
Skipper Leon Johnson was left unbeaten on 30 with three fours while night-watchman Devendra Bishoo who engraved his name in the regional first-class history books after being the lone Guyanese bowler to take 15 wickets in a game was unbeaten on 25. Guyanese-born Trinidad seam bowler Marlon Richards was the pick of the bowlers on the fourth day with figures of 2 for 21 while leg-spinner Amit Jaggernauth picked up 1 for 18.
Guyana ended with 28 points for their efforts.
Guyana had lost the wicket of opener Trevon Griffith for 13, LBW to Jaggernauth before the stroke of stumps on the third day leaving Tagenarine Chanderpaul (7) and Bishoo tasked with taking their team as close as possible to the required target on the final day.
Richards dealt the first blow of the morning yesterday when he had Chanderpaul LBW after hesitantly looking to come forward. Debutant Shimron Hetmyer looking to compensate for his first innings duck, viciously pulled Richards through the square leg region for a boundary to record his maiden first-class runs.
The temperamental 17 year-old repeated a shot similar to that of which brought about his demise in the first innings when he lofted a delivery to Rayad Emrit at mid-off to give Richards his second wicket of the morning.
The skipper who has been the most confident and fluent of the Guyanese batsmen then walked to the middles to partner Bishoo who was well set as the pair took the score to 62 for 3 heading into the lunch period.
Upon the resumption of play both left-handers who looked settled were forced to abandon their innings after the showers returned in all its glory at exactly 13:32hrs.
When play resumed at 16:52hrs, Johnson drove leg-spinner Imran Khan for a boundary through the cover area as the Guyanese looked to get as close as possible to their target.
However at 17:00hrs on the dot umpires decided that an outright win for either side could not be achieved.
Leg-spinner Bishoo was named Man-of-the-Match for his record 15 for 149 runs in the match.
The semi-finals will now see Windwards (65 points) and Trinidad (80 points) playing at the Queens Park Oval, Ground while Jamaica (59 points) will play champions Barbados (82 points) at the Kensington Oval on April 19.
