ABU DHABI, Unit­ed Arab Emi­rates – Nicholas Pooran wast­ed lit­tle time in re­fo­cus­ing af­ter quit­ting the West In­dies white-ball cap­tain­cy, lash­ing a whirl­wind half-cen­tu­ry to fire his Dec­can Glad­i­a­tors to a 35-run vic­to­ry over Team Abu Dhabi on the open­ing day of the Abu Dhabi T10 on Wednes­day.

The 27-year-old Pooran, the Glad­i­a­tors cap­tain, top-scored with an un­beat­en 77 from 33 de­liv­er­ies as his side reached 134 for six from their al­lot­ted 10 overs, af­ter he called cor­rect­ly at the toss at the Sheikh Za­yed Sta­di­um.

Bat­ting at num­ber three, Pooran belt­ed five fours and eight six­es, post­ing 44 for the sec­ond wick­et with open­er Tom Kohler-Cad­more (13) and 72 for the fifth with West In­dies team­mate Odean Smith (23), to pull Glad­i­a­tors out of trou­ble at 60 for four in the fifth over.

On­ly on Mon­day, Pooran an­nounced he was step­ping down as West In­dies white-ball cap­tain, less than sev­en months af­ter be­ing ap­point­ed to the role. He cit­ed the “enor­mous dis­ap­point­ment of the T20 World Cup” as a fac­tor in his de­ci­sion.

Left-arm spin­ner Fabi­an Allen, who had ear­li­er claimed two for 18, then struck an un­beat­en 26 from 13 balls but Team Abu Dhabi could on­ly muster 99 for six from their 10 overs.

Eng­lish­man James Vince top-scored with 37 from 19 balls with four fours and two six­es, putting on 42 for the third wick­et with Allen.

In the first game at the venue, West In­dies open­er Evin Lewis blast­ed 58 from 22 balls with two fours and sev­en six­es as Bangla Tigers brushed aside Kieron Pol­lard’s New York Strik­ers by 19 runs.

Sent in, Tigers gath­ered 131 for five from their 10 overs thanks to the left-hand­ed Lewis who an­chored a 63-run stand for the third wick­et with Col­in Munro (30) and a 29-run, fourth wick­et stand with Ben Cut­ting (11), to pull the in­nings around from 15 for two in the sec­ond over.

For­mer West In­dies pac­er Ravi Ram­paul, 38, fin­ished with two for 16.

In re­ply, Pol­lard slammed a 19-ball un­beat­en 45 but the knock went in vain as Strik­ers fell short at 112 for eight.

Pol­lard, who quit in­ter­na­tion­al crick­et in April and was re­placed by Pooran as cap­tain, count­ed three fours and four six­es in an at­tempt to hold the in­nings to­geth­er as wick­ets tum­bled around him.

How­ev­er, Azam Khan with 34 from 13 balls, was the on­ly oth­er play­er who man­aged to get in­to dou­ble fig­ures, the West In­dies pair of Ro­mario Shep­herd (4) and Akeal Ho­sein (2) both fail­ing.

CMC