BERNARD JR.
Tony Becca, Contributing Editor
THE CARIB Beer cricket series moves into its seventh round today with Jamaica, the runaway leaders, taking on joint second-placed Guyana at Albion in a match that could sentence the rest of the competition to nothing but a contest for second position and a place in the Challenge match the end of season dance between the champions and the runners-up.
With three rounds to go after this one, with a maximum of 12 points per team available from each match, and with Jamaica within sight of victory but not in an invincible position, the contest is far from over.
With 63 points from five victories and a first innings lost draw, however, Jamaica are 29 points ahead of Guyana and the Windward Islands who are on 34 each, and with a little luck in this round, if they win and the Windward Islands lose to Trinidad and Tobago, it could be all over bar the shouting.
Victory for Jamaica would push them to 75 points, it would leave Guyana without a chance of catching them, and if the Windward Islands also lose, they too would be out of it and so too the Leeward Islands who, even if they win and move to 40, would have to win their three remaining matches and hope that Jamaica do not get even one point from their last three.
After defeating the Leeward Islands, the Windward Islands, Barbados, Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago under stand-in captain Tamar Lambert and without batsmen Christopher Gayle, Wavell Hinds, Marlon Samuels and Xavier Marshall, Jamaica, under captain Hinds and with Samuels and Marshall, dropped first innings points to the Leeward Islands in St. Maarten in round six, and although it was victory by an innings and 67 runs at Kensington Park in the fourth round, it could be tough going this time against Guyana.
COULD BE TOUGH GOING
According to some fans, it could be tough going, not because Samuels is injured and out of action, but because the spell that saw them winning some close matches earlier has been broken not only by the omission of a few of the players who fought like tigers in the first five matches, but also by the removal of Lambert as the captain.
The real reason why it could be tougher for Jamaica, however, is because the match will be played at Albion and not at Kensington Park because the pitch at Albion is not a batsman's friend and because Jamaican batsmen are not at home on pitches that are not the best.
There are, however, other reasons. One is that after losing one, drawing two and suffering a no-result in one, Guyana have won their past two matches one against Barbados and one against Trinidad and Tobago; and two is that with Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Ramnaresh Sarwan joining Sewna-rine Chattergoon, Ryan Ramdass, who is coming off back-to-back centuries, Narsingh Deonarine, Assad Fudadin, Lennox Cush and Damador Daesrath, Guyana now boast a powerful batting line-up.
BOWLING WIN MATCHES
Bowling, however, is what wins matches, and if Guyana, as they did against Trinidad and Tobago, go up against Jamaica and a batting line-up of Marshall, Hinds, Donovan Pagon, Brenton Parchment, Lambert, David Bernard Jnr., and Carlton Baugh Jnr., with an attack of only two specialist bowlers in pacer Reon King and legspinner Mahendra Nagamoo-too, they could and should end up chasing leather for a long time.
Jamaica, as they have been doing, are likely to go in with two pacers and two spinners with the medium-pace of Hinds and Bernard in support, the two pacers should be Daren Powell and Jerome Taylor if he is fully fit, the two spinners should be left-arm spinner Nikita Miller and offspinner Bevan Brown, and providing their batsmen bat well, at Albion that should be good enough to maintain their lead and probably even to seal the issue.
