GEORGE­TOWN – Cap­tain Bran­don King has hailed the con­tri­bu­tion of all-rounder Fabi­an Allen af­ter the left-arm spin­ner dis­man­tled St Lu­cia Kings in the first play­off game of the Caribbean Pre­mier League on Tues­day night in Guyana.

Allen pro­duced a de­struc­tive spell of four for 25 which re­strict­ed Kings to a pal­try 125 for nine off their 20 overs, and laid the foun­da­tion for Ja­maica Tallawahs’ com­fort­able five-wick­et win at the Guyana Na­tion­al Sta­di­um.

“[I was im­pressed with] the en­tire bowl­ing unit but ob­vi­ous­ly Fabi­an re­al­ly came up trumps for us tonight,” King said.

“He bowled an in­cred­i­ble spell, got four wick­ets. It’s hard to do that in the last ten overs of a T20 game when guys are try­ing to be ag­gres­sive. [Praise] goes out to him, he had an in­cred­i­ble game.”

Allen’s first two overs cost 15 runs but his third over – the 16th of the in­nings – yield­ed the wick­ets of cap­tain Sikan­dar Raza (19) and top-scor­er Ros­ton Chase (40) and end­ed a piv­otal 29-run, sixth wick­et stand be­tween the pair.

In his fi­nal over, Allen prised out Matthew Forde (4) and Roshon Primus (5) to en­sure there was no late re­vival.

Pri­or to Tues­day night, Allen had sent down on­ly 12 overs in the tour­na­ment with­out a wick­et, but King said his fel­low Ja­maican re­mained a trump card even though his con­tri­bu­tion had been lim­it­ed pre­vi­ous­ly.

“It’s good that I have a lot of op­tions. I’m for­tu­nate as a cap­tain to have such good bowl­ing op­tions in my team that he doesn’t al­ways have to bowl,” King ex­plained.

“I’m just hap­py that when he was called up­on to­day (Tues­day) he came up trumps for us.”

The 28-year-old Allen, who has en­joyed a mixed tour­na­ment, said it was im­por­tant “big play­ers” stepped up when re­quired.

“That’s what big play­ers do. We’re al­ready for the chal­lenge and to­day was nice for me to ex­e­cute,” Allen said.

With the win, Tallawahs ad­vanced to Fri­day’s qual­i­fi­er and await the los­er of Wednes­day night’s sec­ond play­off be­tween Guyana Ama­zon War­riors and Trin­ba­go Knight Rid­ers.

King said his side would be pre­pared to face ei­ther side.

“It doesn’t mat­ter [who we face]. I won’t give any par­tic­u­lar team. We’re hap­py to face any­body and we’re pre­pared to face any­body.”

CMC