At one point, St Lucia Kings, trailing Guyana Amazon Warriors by 139 runs, were down to 51/4. They were under tremendous strain, particularly with five overs remaining and 66 runs required. With 11 deliveries left, Roston Chase and Aaron Jones wrecked havoc, winning the game just as it appeared to be slipping away from St Lucia.
While USA international Aaron Jones hit an undefeated 48 off 31 deliveries, Chase hammered 39* off 22 balls. They shared an innings-long partnership of 88 runs to win St Lucia the much-needed trophy and their first-ever CPL victory.
Following the game, skipper Faf du Plessis noted that the game was losing steam at one point. At that moment, he advised Aaron and Roston to pick up the pace and not leave it too late.
Both cricket players proceeded to play with aggression, contributing to St Lucia Kings’ six-wicket victory. The skipper, however, praised his fellow teammates for occasionally stepping up.
We sent out a message to the players to give it a go since we felt the game was slipping away from us and we couldn’t let it get too late. After that, they began to play some amazing shots. As a team, I am quite pleased of the guys since this group of guys isn’t made up of superstars; at different points during the competition, different guys raised their hands. At the beginning of the St. Lucian tournament, there was much anticipation for this to be the season. Faf remarked during the post-match presentation, “It’s a great achievement to win the first CPL trophy.”
We didn’t have the best of luck today: Imran Tahir
Imran Tahir, the captain of the Guyana Amazon Warriors, thought back on some of the things that didn’t go their way the night of the championship. He pointed out that the team was under pressure to win because they were losing wickets while batting, and it ultimately determined the outcome between the two teams. He was pleased with his team’ performance during the season, though.
The only thing I could find wrong was that we didn’t score enough at the end because we didn’t start off effectively at bat and kept losing wickets. However, we had a great tournament; unfortunately, we didn’t have as much luck today. Some LBWs failed to reach the stumps.
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We bowled pretty well together and had a vague concept of the number (170-180 would have been a respectable total), but one over cost us the game, according to Tahir.