The Guyana Amazon Warriors might have secured a spot in tomorrow’s semifinals of the Hero Caribbean Premier League (CPL) T20 competition but questions remain as to whether the team can go all the way this time.
The recurring theme of this country’s participation in the Biggest Party in Sport is that the Guyana Amazon Warriors are the bridesmaids, never the bride.
Last year the team came perilously close to breaking the jinx beating all and sundry on their way to reaching the finals undefeated, a feat never before done in the history of the competition.
Then in a final that was theirs to win, the Guyana Amazon Warriors somehow managed to snatch defeat against a team that they had beaten in their previous matchups, a Barbados Trident team led by Jason Holder.
This year, only a win in the final of the prestigious regional T20 showpiece event can erase that bitter taste of defeat which the Guyana Amazon Warriors tasted last year. Under new captain Chris Green, the team lived up to its pre-tournament disclosure of wanting to peak at the right time. After an indifferent start they have won three on the trot on their way to reaching the semifinals but questions remain about the team’s chances of bring home the coveted bacon.
The major question mark surrounds the batting department or to be more specific, the performances of the two opening batsmen.
Last year Brandon King, was the undoubted `King’ of the T20 competition and it is safe to say that his contribution with the bat went a long way to the team’s overall performances and his eventual selection on the West Indies team.
His unbeaten 132 in Qualifer One against the Barbados Tridents, the highest individual score in the competition, helped the team seal a spot in the final and was as classy a T20 innings as ever.
He also had scores of 81 not out, 59, 51 not out, 43 and 49 to name a few.
This year, the `King’ has had scores of nought, 5, 51 not out, 14, 6, nought, 29, 10 and nought and has been dethroned so to speak as the team’s best batsman by either Nicholas Pooran, who has scored the competition’s only century to date or Shimron Hetymyer who has the most runs in the competition with three half centuries.
King’s opening partner the left handed Guyanese Chandrapaul Hemraj is also finding it difficult getting among the runs.
Small wonder that the team struggled in the early stages of this year’s competition before apparently finding its groove.
However, their expected opponents in the final should they get there, the Tringabo Knight Riders, has done what the Amazon Warriors did last year, play unbeaten and are poised to be the first team to go all the way.
Unlike the Amazon Warriors, their opening batsman in Colin Munro and Lendl Simmons seems to have found ominous form and Darren Bravo and the dangerous skipper Kieron Pollard have also been among the runs.
In the bowling department Dwayne Bravo has etched his own name in the tournament’s history books by becoming the first bowler to snare 100 wickets and in a nutshell the team is oozing confidence.
The Guyana Amazon warriors know one thing, it’s not about the early running but how you finish.
Let’s hope that the Amazon Warriors can finish this year’s COVID-19 pandemic affected competition on the right note so that their loyal fans can call them not the Amazon Warriors but the Amazing Warriors.