BRIDGETOWN, Bar­ba­dos – An­tigua and Bar­bu­da Fal­cons as­sis­tant coach and bowl­ing con­sul­tant Sir Curt­ly Am­brose said he is not sur­prised by the team’s ti­tle-win­ning per­for­mance in the just con­clud­ed Caribbean Pre­mier League.

The Fal­cons cap­tured their maid­en CPL ti­tle on Sun­day night in dom­i­nant fash­ion with a com­pre­hen­sive eight-wick­et win over the Ja­maica Kings­men at Kens­ing­ton Oval.

While the ac­com­plish­ment might come as a sur­prise to many, the leg­endary West In­dies fast bowler said he al­ways be­lieved the team had the tal­ent to go all the way.

“When we start­ed the CPL tour­na­ment, not many gave us a chance to qual­i­fy, let alone win the cham­pi­onship. They called oth­er fran­chis­es, but we were hap­py with that be­cause be­ing un­der­dogs means we were un­der no pres­sure to per­form.

“We knew that we had a great team that is ca­pa­ble of not on­ly win­ning games, but win­ning the cham­pi­onship, and for 2026, the An­tigua and Bar­bu­da Fal­cons are the CPL cham­pi­ons,” Sir Curt­ly said.

It proved to be the per­fect birth­day gift for Sir Curt­ly, who cel­e­brat­ed his 63rd birth­day on Mon­day.

He said the com­mit­ment of the en­tire coach­ing staff as well as the sup­port of An­tiguans and Bar­bu­dans con­tributed to­wards the team’s suc­cess.

“Coach Nixon al­ways stressed that: no pres­sure. We work hard, we play to­geth­er as a team, we en­joy what we do and we reap the ben­e­fits. As Ibis [Steve Free­land] al­ways says, ‘Be­lieve nah man!’ We kept be­liev­ing, and we knew we had what it takes.

“And, of course, our Prime Min­is­ter [Gas­ton Browne] is here, the oth­er min­is­ters of gov­ern­ment are here, the Bar­ba­dos Prime Min­is­ter [Mia Mot­t­ley] is here as well, so it’s a to­tal cel­e­bra­tion, and I’m lov­ing it,” Sir Curt­ly said.

CMC