MOHALI, India, CMC – Captain Rayad Emrit has defended seamer Ravi Rampaul, following the Barbados Tridents’ defeat to Kings XI Punjab, in their opening game of the Champions League Twenty20 here Saturday and says his side now needs to bounce back quickly.
With Kings XI requiring 25 from the last two overs to get up to their target of 175, Rampaul conceded 20 from the penultimate over of the innings, to let the Indian Premier League side off the hook.
Kings XI then got the five runs needed from the last over to wrap up a four-wicket win with two balls remaining at the Punjab Cricket Association Stadium.
“We spoke about the lengths that we wanted to bowl,” Emrit said following the defeated.
“Ravi is one of our most experienced bowlers and on another day, he would have gotten it right. Those things happen it just didn’t happen today [for him].”
Akshar Patel blasted the first two balls of Rampaul’s over for four after the bowler missed his length, and edged the fifth delivery – another length delivery – to third man for another boundary.
The last ball of the over was short and Patel hooked over deep square leg for six.
He finished unbeaten on 23 from just nine balls, sharing 47 for the seventh wicket with David Miller, who was voted Man-of-of-the-Match for his unbeaten 46 off 34 deliveries.
They pulled their side around from a position of 131 from six in the 17th over, when Tridents seemed poised to pull off a win in their maiden outing in the CLT20.
“We know in the last five overs … bowlers can go for 50, 60 runs so we knew in the last five overs we needed to keep tight,” Emrit said.
“I still thought that with two overs to go, with Kings XI needing 25, 26 runs, I still believed that we could have won it.”
He added: “We dropped easy catches. The first one [the fielders] never called for it, the second one was to the keeper. They were just basic mistakes. When we batted, we got a couple chances and when they batted, they got a couple chances.
“We just need to come back hard in the next game. It’s a sad way to lose but we need to bounce back.”
Tridents did well to post 174 for six from their 20 overs after they were sent in, with left-hander Raymon Reifer getting a top score of 60 not out off 42 balls and opener Dilshan Munaweera, 50 off 26 deliveries.
Emrit said they believed the score was one they could have defended.
“We were looking at anything over 170-175 so 174 we were pleased with it,” he said.
“We thought that the wicket wasn’t coming on as it used to so we thought that the middle overs would be very important.”
Barbados Tridents next face Cape Cobras on Friday.
