Vin­ode Mam­chan

Rayad Em­rit cas­tled Jomel War­ri­can to spark wild cel­e­bra­tions among the 7,000 fans at the Queen's Park Oval on Sat­ur­day night, as the coun­try won its 12th re­gion­al lim­it­ed overs ti­tle, dent­ing Bar­ba­dos Pride by 72 runs in the fi­nals of the 2016 Nagi­co Su­per50 Cup.

A sea of red kept up the Car­ni­val cel­e­bra­tions as fans put the five killings on the day be­hind them to cel­e­brate 11 good cit­i­zens who brought glo­ry to the coun­try. For their ef­forts, mem­bers of the Red Force walked away with US$10,000, while the Bar­ba­di­ans got US$5,000.

Styl­ish bats­man Dar­ren Bra­vo smashed a bril­liant 97 to guide his team to a healthy 270 for sev­en, leav­ing the bowlers to per­form the fi­nal rites, dis­miss­ing the Bar­ba­di­ans for 198.

Man-of-the-match Bra­vo fol­lowed his 82 and 95 in his two pre­vi­ous in­nings with a ma­tured in­nings and would have count­ed him­self un­lucky to not reg­is­ter his sixth re­gion­al List A cen­tu­ry, as he edged Ja­son Hold­er to stand in wick­et­keep­er Shai Hope, play­ing an ex­pan­sive dri­ve. His eight fours and two six­es which came from104 balls, was the back­bone of the T&T in­nings, as he shared im­por­tant part­ner­ships, first with skip­per Ja­son Mo­hammed (31) which was worth 75 for the fourth wick­et, and then 57 with De­nesh Ramdin (26) for the fifth wick­et, to set up a strong bat­ting per­for­mance for the home team.

The game was as good as over af­ter Rayad Em­rit and Mar­lon Richards sliced through the top of Bar­ba­dos bat­ting, leav­ing them limp­ing at 31/4.

Richards re­moved the dan­ger­ous Dwayne Smith (5) and Shar­marh Brooks (2) while Em­rit bowled Kraigg Brath­waite (5) and Jonathon Carter (0).

Open­er Shai Hope and his cap­tain Ja­son Hold­er re­vived the in­nings adding 32 for the fifth wick­et be­fore off spin­ner Jon Ross Jagge­sar dis­missed Hold­er (14) and bowled Shane Dowrich (14), to leave Bar­ba­dos 80-6.

Open­er Kyle Hope who de­fied the at­tack as wick­ets fell around him added 59 with up and com­ing West In­dies all­rounder Car­los Brath­waite (46), but the lat­ter's dis­missal at 139 saw wick­ets tum­bling and the Ba­jans plung­ing to 149 for 9 be­fore there was a last wick­et flur­ry from Sulie­man Benn (27 not out) and War­ri­can (24), who added 49 for the last wick­et.

Hope made 50 from 92 balls and struck five fours.

Em­rit was T&T's most suc­cess­ful bowler with 3-46 while Richards (2-38), Jagge­sar (2-30) and Ho­sein (2-55) lent ad­mirable sup­port.

Ear­li­er, Bar­ba­dos won the toss and sent T&T in. Open­ers Kyle Hope and Evin Lewis bat­ted with lit­tle dif­fi­cul­ties, adding 54 for the first wick­et un­til Lewis was giv­en out caught be­hind off Brath­waite for 25. The open­er looked dis­ap­point­ed at the dis­missal and tele­vi­sion re­views sug­gest­ed that um­pire Patrick Gus­tard made a wrong call. His 25 runs came off 34 balls with four fours. Hope and Kjorn Ot­t­ley took the score in­to the 70s but a dou­ble strike brought Bar­ba­dos right back in­to the game. Hope the Christchurch born Bar­ba­di­an fi­nal­ly al­lowed his coun­try­men to breathe, as he left the are­na leg be­fore to Dwayne Smith for 34. He faced 52 balls and struck six fours. Six runs lat­er an up­pish dri­ve brought the down­fall of Ot­t­ley for 10.

At 78 for three, the Red Force were a spot of both­er but Bra­vo hero­ics set the tone for what was to be a T&T vic­to­ry.

SCORE­BOARD

T&T Red Force inns

E Lewis c Dowrich b Brath­waite 25

K Hope lbw Smith 34

K Ot­t­ley c Benn b Nurse 10

D Bra­vo c Hope b Hold­er 97

J Mo­hammed c Brooks b Benn 31

D Ramdin b Brath­waite 26

R Em­rit run out 18

M Richards not out 9

Ex­tras 2lb, 16w, 2nb 20

To­tal for 7 wk­ts (50) 270

Fall of wk­ts: 54, 72, 78, 153, 210, 253, 270.

Bowl­ing: J Hold­er 8-1-54-1, A Nurse 9-0-42-1, C Brath­waite 10-1-54-2, S Benn 8-0-42-1, D Smith 7-0-32-1, J War­ri­can 5-0-16-0, J Carter 3-0-28-0.

Bar­ba­dos Pride inns

D Smith c Em­rit b Richards 5

K Brath­waite b Em­rit 5

S Hope c De­onar­ine b Ho­sein 50

J Carter b Em­rit 0

S Brooks c Ramdin b Richards 2

J Hold­er c Ramdin b Jagges­sar 14

S Dowrich b Jagges­sar 14

C Brath­waite lbw De­onar­ine 46

A Nurse c De­onar­ine b Ho­sein 2

J War­ri­can b Em­rit 24

S Benn not out 27

Ex­tras 1b, 2lb, 6w 9

To­tal all out (42.5) 198

Fall of wk­ts: 5, 10, 22, 31, 63, 80, 139, 142, 149, 198.

Bowl­ing: R Em­rit 9.5-0-46-3, M Richards 8-0-38-2, J Jagges­sar 9-1-30-2, A Ho­sein 10-1-55-2, N De­onar­ine 6-1-26-1.

RE­GION­AL 50-OVERS TI­TLES

T&T - 12 (one shared)

Guyana - 7 (two shared)

Ja­maica - 7 (one shared)

Bar­ba­dos - 6 (one shared)

Lee­wards - 4 (three shared)

Wind­wards - 3