Vin­ode Mam­chan

Ever since crick­et start­ed there was a say­ing: 'catch­es win match­es'. Up un­til last night the T&T Red Steel did not get the point as they dropped many catch­es to al­low the Ja­maica Tallawahs to get back in­to their play-off and de­feat them by four wick­ets at Warn­er Park in St. Kitts.

Chas­ing 156 runs for vic­to­ry, the Tallawahs were up against it at 76 for six but that man An­dre Rus­sell with the help off poor out­field­ing brought the vic­to­ry home in the last over.

Rus­sell banged 62 from an un­be­liev­able 27 balls to send Dwayne Bra­vo's men home. He was dropped twice and with eight need­ed in the last over Evin Lewis put down Rusty Theron as the Tallawahs got the win.

They now go on to play the Guyana Ama­zon War­riors to­day in the sec­ond play-off at the same venue.

The Red Steel miss­ing top bowler Samuel Badree fought a good fight for three quar­ters of the game but Rus­sell who is fast be­com­ing a T20 su­per­star was too much on the op­po­si­tion as he en­ter­tain ed the fans with very ball he faced.

Bra­vo lost the toss for the third suc­ces­sive match here and his op­po­site num­ber Chris Gayle sent the Red Steel in to bat. When the um­pires called play, there were more fire­crack­ers than fans.

The big Tallawah, Gayle used medi­um pac­er David Bernard Ju­nior to open the at­tack with the ex­pe­ri­enced Daniel Vet­tori and this proved a gold­en move.

Bernard bowl­ing some nag­ging away swingers was able to knock­out three top or­der bats­men and at the end of the 'pow­er play, Red Steel was in tat­ters at 37 for three

Kevin O'Brien con­tin­ued his poor re­cent run and fell for 11 and he was quick­ly fol­lowed in­to the dug out by Nasir Jamshed (four) and the in­form Evin Lewis 18.

These quick loss­es re­quired a care­ful ap­proach and when the drinks break was tak­en mid­way through the in­nings, the score was 61 for three.

For the ma­jor part of the in­nings Dar­ren Bra­vo looked more like BRC while Tay­lor was the re­al steel. While Bra­vo strug­gled to find his tim­ing, the New Zealan­der was bril­liant, find­ing the gaps and play­ing crisp shots.

The right han­der rapid­ly moved on to 70 and just when he need­ed to fin­ish big in the last two overs, he fell. He faced 44 balls and struck sev­en fours and three six­es. Tay­lor's as­so­ci­a­tion with Bra­vo was worth 110 runs in 12.4 overs. The left hand­ed Bra­vo fol­lowed his part­ner to the dug out of their big stand. He scored 33 off 35 balls with two fours and a six.

SCORE­BOARD

T&T Red Steel vs Ja­maica Tallawahs

Red Steel inns

K O'Brien c Gayle b Bernard 11

E Lewis c Bon­ner b Bernard 18

N Jamshed c Bon­ner b Bernard 4

R Tay­lor c Tay­lor b Theron 70

DM Bra­vo c Bon­ner b Theron 33

N Pooran c Theron b Rus­sell 3

DJ Bra­vo not out 2

K Coop­er not out 1

Ex­tras w12, nb1 13

To­tal 6 wk­ts (20ovs) 55

FOW: 18, 34, 36, 146, 148, 151.

Bowl­ing: D Vet­tori 3-0-21-0 (2w), D Bernard 4-0-19-3 (1w), J Tay­lor 4-0-41-0 (4w), A Rus­sell 4-0-37-1 (1nb, 4w), J Theron 4-0-32-2, N Miller 1-0-5-0.

Tallawahs inns

C Gayle lbw Gabriel 1

C Wal­ton c Mo­hammed b Benn 8

N Bon­ner run out 39

A Vo­ges run out 1

J Black­wood lbw Benn 4

D Bernard c Tay­lor c Benn 6

A Rus­sell not out 62

J Theron not out 18

Ex­tras lb1, w18 19

To­tal 6wk­ts (19.4ovs) 158

FOW: 3, 24, 25, 39, 72, 76.

Bowl­ing: S Gabriel 4-0-33-1, DJ Bra­vo 3.4-0-35-0, S Benn 4-0-27-3, K Coop­er 4-1-25-0, J Mo­hammed 4-0-37-0.

Re­sult: Tallawahs won by 4 wk­ts.?