MARLON Samuels’ stroke-filled 71 and South African chinaman Tabraiz Shamsi’s career-best figures of 4 for 10 set up a convincing eight-wicket win for St Kitts & Nevis Patriots against Barbados Tridents in Basseterre.The Tridents openers – Dilshan Munaweera and Dwayne Smith – began the innings solidly, adding 47 in 38 balls before the introduction of spin halted their progress. Shahid Afridi struck with his second ball and in the eighth over Shamsi bowled Smith.
Scores: St Kitts & Nevis Patriots 139 for 2 (Samuels 71*, Guptill 45) beat Barbados Tridents 135 for 8 (Pollard 49, Shamsi 4-10, Afridi 3-34) by eight wickets.
Jason Holder, batting at No. 4, struggled to find fluency during his 19-ball 17 and Shamsi’s double-strike in the 14th over left Tridents wobbling at 76 for 5.
However, Kieron Pollard resurrected the innings with a 33-ball 49, including five sixes – with two each in the 19th and 20th overs. Tridents smashed 47 off the last three overs to end with 135 for 8 – all wickets falling to spin except for a run-out.
While Afridi took three wickets, Shamsi bettered his best bowling performance of 4 for 23 against Jamaica Tallawahs in his last match with figures of 4 for 10 – all his wickets were of the top-six batsmen.
Evin Lewis and Martin Guptill started the chase by hitting three fours and a six inside the first three overs, before Lewis was caught at mid-off. Tridents struggled to prevent the boundaries as Samuels and Guptill clobbered three sixes and two fours within the Powerplay.
The pair continued to rotate the strike with the occasional boundary before Guptill was run-out for 45 in the 15th over to end an 85-run second-wicket stand.
Samuels, however, plundered 18 in the next over and eventually hit the winning runs in the 18th over.