(jamaicaobserver.com) HOST Jamaica suffered their first defeat in the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) Regional Under-19 Championship when they went down by 127 runs to the Windward Islands in round two at Chedwin Park yesterday.
Both teams had come off victories in their opening encounter and were confident of securing win number two on what looked a very dry batting strip.
The Jamaicans did well enough to restrict their opponents to a respectable target, but later produced a below-par batting performance and fell short in the end.
Scores: Windward Island 227 all out (49.2 overs); Jamaica 99 all out (35.3 overs).
The Windwards were 50 without loss with six overs on the board after winning the toss and taking first strike. However, the Jamaicans managed to slow the flow of runs and picked up a few quick wickets in the middle overs.
Captain Michael Frew ripped through the Windwards' middle order, but two unfortunate dropped chances allowed Dornan Edwards to push on to a top score of 61, before the team was eventually bowled out.
Emmanuel Stewart was the next best scorer with 36, against Frew's 4-30, while Odean Smith, Gareth Henry and Abijhai Mansingh got two wickets a piece.
Jamaica's run chase got off to a horrible start with Jevoy Spence being caught off the third ball of the innings without a run on the board. Abijhai Mansingh (nine) and Ramone Francis (16) tried to restore the innings, but both batsmen went in consecutive overs with the score at 34-3.
First match hero, Shahid Crooks, never got going and when he went caught behind for 19, the batting line-up collapsed with only Brad Barnes, 30, offering minimal resistance.
Pacer Ryan John, who ended on a hat-trick, took 4-16 from 7.3 overs, with support from Gidron Pope who had 2-12.
Coach Robert Samuels conceded that they were outplayed by their opponents.
"I think we were outplayed in every department. Windward Island is usually not the best team in the region, but they have improved and they are improving, and today (yesterday) they showed that they can play cricket, so kudos to them," he told the Jamaica Observer.
His counterpart Walter Emmanuel applauded his team.
"I thought we played very well against Jamaica today, because scoring over 200 runs on that wicket, I knew we had enough runs and a strong bowling attack to defend it," he said.
At St Elizabeth Technical High School Trinidad & Tobago suffered a second-consecutive loss when they went down by three wickets to Guyana.
Scores: T&T 154-8 (50 overs); Guyana 157-7 (37 overs).
Asked to bat first Trinidad & Tobago once again struggled with the bat. They found runs hard to come by and could only manage a paltry total from the allotted overs. Cephas Cooper top-scored with an unbeaten 48, while Keagan Simmons contributed 32 against Sherfane Rutherford's 2-26.
Tevin Imlach then scored an unbeaten 61 to lead the Guyanese successful run chase with 13 overs to spare. Parmankand Ramdhan (27) also got among the runs against the attack of Akeel Seetal (3-34) and Anderson Phillip (2-30).
Meanwhile, the Leeward Islands were also on the winning end with a 16-run victory over Barbados at Ewarton.
Scores: The Leeward Islands 220 all out (45.3 overs); Barbados 204 all out (48.4 overs).
Batting first, the Leewards, led by a knock of 81 from Kacey Carty and 49 from Tyrone Williams, got to a moderate total despite Dominic Drake's five for 45. Shamar Springer (2-36) gave good support.
In reply, Leniko Boucher (36), Springer (30) and Akil Greenidge (28) were not enough to hand Barbados win number two.
