Bar­ba­dos, the coun­try that has pro­duced the most crick­et­ing leg­ends in the West In­dies, is primed to get back on top of crick­et in the blue Caribbean Isles.

When Crick­et West In­dies (CWI) post­poned its Four-day Cham­pi­onships on March 16 due to the COVID-19, Bar­ba­dos was well on top of the stand­ings af­ter eight of the 10 rounds of match­es.

There is a say­ing that “when Bar­ba­dos crick­et is strong, West In­dies crick­et is strong” and the per­for­mance of the Bar­ba­di­an team au­gurs well for re­gion­al crick­et as sev­er­al very tal­ent­ed young play­ers are now com­ing through the ranks.

Af­ter eight rounds, Bar­ba­dos has gar­nered 134.8 points hav­ing won six of its eight match­es. It was de­feat­ed twice this sea­son but has been the most con­sis­tent of the six teams. Guyana, which has won the ti­tle for the last five years, is cur­rent­ly 43 points away in the third po­si­tion, and with two rounds of match­es to go af­ter the coro­n­avirus break, it will be hard­pressed to re­peat as cham­pi­on.

Bar­ba­dos start­ed its cam­paign on the wrong foot as it went un­der to the Wind­ward Is­lands by three wick­ets at the Arnos Vale play­ing field in St Vin­cent and the Grenadines.

Kyle May­ers stroked a cen­tu­ry for the Ba­jans as they post­ed a first-in­ning score of 233. The Wind­wards re­spond­ed with 234 runs in their first knock. West In­dies open­er Kraigg Brath­waite then scored 72 to lead them to 269 but they lost the game as the Wind­wards reached their tar­get of 269 thanks to Desron Mal­oney’s 83.

Lick­ing their wounds, the Bar­ba­di­ans next stop was home at the famed Kens­ing­ton Oval where they de­feat­ed Guyana by sev­en wick­ets. West In­dies pac­er Ke­mar Roach starred with the ball, col­lect­ing 4/28 in the first in­nings. Keon Hard­ing 4/77 did the dam­age to Guyana in the sec­ond in­nings. The men who con­tributed sig­nif­i­cant­ly with the bat for Bar­ba­dos were May­ers (75) and West In­dies mid­dle-or­der bats­man Jonathan Carter (73).

With the win and the con­fi­dence, the play­ers board­ed a flight to Ja­maica where they hum­bled the home team by 119 runs at Sabi­na Park. May­ers again count­ed runs with the bat get­ting 53 in the first in­nings and 53 in the sec­ond. West In­dies wick­et­keep­er Shane Dowrich scored 73 in the sec­ond in­nings. Chemar Hold­er, a for­mer West In­dies Un­der-19 fast bowler, col­lect­ed five wick­ets to keep Ja­maica in check and col­lect­ed an­oth­er six to end the match with 11 scalps, en­sur­ing the win.

While on the road, Bar­ba­dos then jet­ted off to Warn­er Park in St Kitts where it con­tin­ued its win­ning form, record­ing an in­ning and 81-run win over the Lee­ward Is­lands. Spin­ner Ka­marie Boyce took five wick­ets to bowl out the home team for 181 de­spite 76 from West In­dies play­er Keiran Pow­ell. Shamarh Brooks then scored a cen­tu­ry and May­ers con­tin­ued his pur­ple patch with 69 to give Bar­ba­dos a healthy 398. The Lee­wards then fold­ed for 136 in their sec­ond in­nings. Hold­er had an­oth­er three wick­ets to add to his al­ready im­pres­sive tal­ly for the sea­son.

Back home, they were faced with a chal­lenge from T&T and the hosts came up trumps with a mas­sive 299-run win. Bat­ting first they got to just 209. Hard­ing took 5/57 to bowl out T&T for 175 giv­ing Bar­ba­dos a slen­der lead of 34 runs.

Open­ers Brath­waite (53) and Shane Mose­ley (155 not out) car­ried their team to 342/5. T&T was then bowled out for 77 by Hard­ing who took 5/19 and 10 wick­ets in the match.

The fol­low­ing week, Bar­ba­dos host­ed the Wind­wards for its sec­ond game against them this sea­son and ran away with a 127-run vic­to­ry. May­ers con­tin­ued his great form with 140 runs as Bar­ba­dos tal­lied 417 to take con­trol of the game ear­ly. Hold­er then grabbed five wick­ets as the Is­landers were dis­missed for 258. Bar­ba­dos’ sec­ond crack with the bat saw then tal­ly 239 for four with May­ers again amongst the runs with 62 not out.

Ker­ron Cot­toy scored a cen­tu­ry for the Wind­wards but the oth­er bats­men caved-in to Roach, who end­ed the game with 6/84.

Bar­ba­dos then flew across to T&T and against all odds the host team de­feat­ed them. Buoyed by the re­turn of its cap­tain Dar­ren Brave, the T&T team won the toss and bat­ted first scor­ing 239. There was half-cen­tu­ry to West In­dies A team play­er Joshua DaSil­va. Hold­er was the chief de­stroy­er with four wick­ets, while there were three apiece for May­ers and Kevin Stoute.

Bar­ba­dos re­spond­ed with 260 af­ter be­ing 83/6 at one point. Dowrich slammed 96 and off-spin­ner Ash­ley Nurse 81 to lead the charge as young pac­er An­der­son Phillip snared 6/59. T&T in its sec­ond turn made 350 with West In­dies bats­man Ja­son Mo­hammed get­ting 112 and Bar­ba­di­an im­port Kyle Hope 67. Nurse fol­lowed his good bat­ting with four wick­ets. Bar­ba­dos was then bowled out for 182 in their sec­ond in­nings de­spite 42 from May­ers.

The Bar­ba­di­ans then head­ed to Guyana. A first in­ning of 174 was not much to write home about. How­ev­er, their bowlers came to the park and Guyana was bowled out for 55. Roach had 5/20 and West In­dies Test cap­tain Ja­son Hold­er 4/24. Bat­ting a sec­ond time, Bar­ba­dos made 210 with Brath­waite find­ing his mo­jo and scor­ing 84 not out. Guyana then failed mis­er­ably with the bat again in its sec­ond in­nings scor­ing just 94 with Roach tak­ing 4/36.

So Bar­ba­dos is primed to be­come kings of the Caribbean again with two rounds to go. In the sec­ond po­si­tion is T&T with 94.6 points.