Head coach of the Guyana Jaguars, Rayon Griffith is satisfied with his team’s performance after dominating Barbados Pride in the ninth round of the Cricket West Indies Regional Four-Day Championships last week at Providence.
The seven-wicket victory ensured the Jaguars remain at the top of the table with 136 points while Leeward Islands Hurricanes are trailing with 110.8 points and two matches to go.
Speaking of the outcome of the match, Griffith credited it as a “good win”
“As I said before, we needed two wins to make sure we don’t have to depend on anybody,” he said.
“We dominated the Pride in this game,” said Griffith while acknowledging the contribution of Barbados-born all-rounder, Raymon Reifer who finished with match figures of 9-42 and who also scored 52 not out.
Griffith was also satisfied with opener, Chandrapaul Hemraj who scored a half century in the second innings during the chase of 114. He opined that regardless of the size of the chase, it is always important for someone at the top to come in and score freely.
The former national player explained that Hemraj’s style of batting was suited at the top of the order since it took the pressure off of the other batsman as he (Hemraj) scores freely and at a fast rate.
Also interesting in the match was the exclusion of left-arm spinner, Gudakesh Motie and the inclusion of debutant, Ramaal Lewis.
“For the year, we have been playing left arm spinners…and we had Narsingh Deonarine who used to play as a batter who always brought that option [off-spin] but now it is missing so we took that risk and we knew Ramaal is a decent bowler and we backed him.
“I know he can bowl, he did well in the Super50 and now he bowled in the right areas where we wanted him to bowl,” he added.
After winning convincingly inside three days, the Jaguars will now turn their focus to Trinidad and Tobago Red Force who they will battle at Providence in a day-and-night affair in their final fixture.
Griffith said the batting still needs to get better totals in the first innings.
He said the batting line up was strong with Sherfane Rutherford batting down the order and said he backed them to make at least 350 runs.
