They are the defending KFC Cup One-day champions. They also won the inaugural Stanford Twenty20 cricket competition beating none other than Trinidad and Tobago in the finals last year.
But, with only eight points from the preliminary rounds and only qualifying for the Final Four after Trinidad did them a favour by defeating Jamaica by two wickets last Saturday, The Guyana team’s status as the premier Limited Overs team in the region is on the line
Guyana will be looking to put their performance in the preliminaries firmly behind them and hope that they can recapture the form that made them the top One-Day regional team in their semi-final clash on Thursday against the team from the Twin-island republic.
Trinidad, on the other hand, will remember last year’s agonizing defeat in the Stanford tournament and will be looking to avenge that loss and maintain their unbeaten streak in this year’s competition.
The Guyana team flew out yesterday morning for St Vincent and the Grenadines.
The squad is unchanged from the one that lost to Barbados in Saturday’s final round KFC game and the team was optimistic of their chances against the tournament favourites.
“We have a good chance against Trinidad especially with Shivnarine Chanderpaul back. Of course it would be better if we had Ramnaresh Sarwan also, but I feel confident with the team we have,” skipper Narsingh Deonarine said yesterday just before the team departed for the Timehri International Airport.
Deonarine, who missed that game against Barbados through injury, said the strained hamstring which kept him out of the Carib Beer contest against Barbados is much better.
The Guyana all-rounder has been having good starts with the bat but has not been converting those starts to three figures.
“I have been consistently getting good scores, but not getting hundreds I just need to carry on when I get to that stage,” he said
“We needed to score about 25 more runs,” he said, in response to what went wrong against Barbados. Trinidad has been playing well. We cannot afford to make that mistake against them,” he added.
The Trinidad team has been boosted by the presence of Lendl Simmons, the West Indies One-day player who played against Jamaica in the last game after returning from India with the West Indies team.
However, Trinidad has available the services of a much bigger presence in West Indies captain and multiple world record holder Brian Lara that they can call upon.
Should Lara play and with Chanderpaul in the Guyana line-up the match could well turn out to be a fire cracker.
Guyana Coach Albert Smith said yesterday: “We have to look at the last game we played and make some adjustments. I personally feel that we need to look at two seamers in the team.”
When Stabroek Sports pointed out that off-spinner Royston Crandon had been very effective opening the bowling and in the last match bowled 10 overs for 31 runs while taking a wicket, Smith said: “Yes, he normally bowls very tight and has been effective and that’s why we keep starting with him. We don’t have to open the bowling with two seamers. Trinidad, however, is more comfortable against the slower stuff well and we have to be prepared for that,” he said
When quizzed about Twin-island republic’s team the coach said:” Well they have been playing very good cricket and can still call on West Indies batting star Brian Lara. Young Kieron Pollard is also a cause for concern. They field a very talented team and we have to be prepared for them.”
The Guyana squad is as follows Narsingh Deonarine (captain) Sewnarine Chattergoon, Royston Crandon, Travis Dowlin, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Assad Fudadin, Dion Ferrier, Derwin Christian, Esuan Crandon, Mahendra Nagamootoo, Verasammy Permaul, Jeremy Gordon, Azeemul Hannif, and Reon King.
