National Under–19 captain, Ronaldo Ali–Mohammed has hailed his side’s efforts after capturing the Regional Under–19 one –day and three day tournaments in St Kitts, calling it a great feeling shortly after landing in Guyana at the Eugene F. Correia International Airport yesterday.
Ali–Mohammed now becomes the second cricketer to lead Guyana to a Regional Under–19 double triumph after Brian Sattaur led Guyana to their first double in 2014. The one-day championship win is Guyana’s fourth in a row, starting with Sattaur’s triumph in 2014.
“It feels great to be crowned champions once more,” Ali–Mohammed, who was a member of the 2016 side said adding: “It was a great effort from the guys throughout the whole tournament.”
He also sang praises of Raymond Perez and Bhaskar Yadram‘s efforts after the two topped the individual batting and bowling charts in the one – dayers.
Ali-Mohammed, a Georgetown Cricket Club all-rounder, commenting on what made Guyana such a formidable force in this year’s tournament, credited the input from Coach Julian Moore, his players and the tremendous support the side received from the 12th man back home.
Meanwhile, Coach Moore, during an exclusive interview with Stabroek Sport prior to the team’s departure, predicted that Guyana would have come out on top.
“I think it’s a good bunch of guys we had this year. I thought the talent was good; you could have seen that since the Under–19 Inter-County, and some of the fellas have been around for a while,” Moore said yesterday.
He added: “We had a pretty good tournament. A lot of the players stepped up individually but I thought we played as a team and we reaped the benefits of that.”
One such player who certainly stepped up to the plate was opener Raymond Perez who had a prolific run in the one – day format to cop the Most Valuable Player (MVP) and the highest run scorer awards after carving out 348 runs on the back of four fifties with his best return being an unbeaten 77 against the Windward Islands in Guyana’s final match.
Perez, who also addressed the media upon the team’s return yesterday, said that he stuck with the basics while personally focusing on coming out with the most runs in the shorter format of the tournament.
Other award winners were Yadram, who in the one – dayers, snared 17 scalps, the most in that format which included a best of 6 – 16 against the Leeward Islands to walk away with the bowler with the most wickets in that format and the most in a match awards, respectively.
Ramnarine Chattura, Kevin Sinclair, Ali-Mohammed, Richie Looknaught and Joshua Persaud were the other consistent performers this year.
