ARNOS VALE, St. Vincent—Led by two outstanding performances by two St. Maarten cricketers in Chamiqueko Landefort and Nathan Edward, the Leeward Islands U19 team fought tooth-and-nail for a draw against their Barbados counterpart and collect the Cricket West Indies Rising Stars championship trophy in St. Vincent on Saturday. Although the match ended in a nail-biting draw, the Leeward Islands U19 team collected enough batting and bowling points in the match to edge out the Bajans who were on top of the table at the start of the match.
The turning point of the match was when Landefort produced a destructive fast bowling spell that helped knock over the Bajans for just 76 off 21.3 overs in their second innings. The match had suffered many delays and interruptions because of rain but meandered into boredom until Landefort’s exciting spell. Edward dismissed opener Achilles Brown for naught and then Landefort grabbed the next four wickets on the trot to leave the sub-champions in tatters at 35 for five by the 10th over. With one of their batsmen unable to bat because of injury, the opposition never recovered from that precarious position. A first innings lead of 29 plus its second innings score, Barbados set the Leeward Islands 106 to win off a minimum of 26 overs. Landefort and the Leeward Islands players had suddenly turned the match in their favour. Landefort bowling figures were 6-1-23-4.
However, that ascendency suddenly dipped into battling for survival as the Bajan boys rebounded with their own bowling hero in left arm spinner Nathan Sealy who collected six wickets for 10 runs with eight maidens off a total of 14 overs. Sealy was just a real threat for the Leeward Islands batsmen. And while Landefort and all fast bowlers in the tournament could only bowl six overs per session, Sealy and the other spinners were unrestricted. Sealy bowled with excellent smarts and control to beguile the batsman and created an opportunity for his team to win.
By the time Edward walked to the crease, his team was on the verge of losing the match at 43 for seven with more than 30 minutes still to bat. Edward, nevertheless, guided the lower order batsmen as they barely survived to hold on to a draw. Edward, who was dropped at slip by Sealy in the penultimate over of the match, faced 55 balls for 11 runs (1x4). Only Jewel Andrew with 18 off 28 balls (1x4, 1x6) was the other batsman in double figures. The Leeward Islands reached 51 for nine off 28 overs to stave off a loss that looked likely when Edward walked to the crease.
In the first innings, Barbados scored 279 for eight declared to which, the eventual winner replied with 250 for eight declared off 110 overs.
For this tournament, there were four players from St. Maarten in Edward, Landefort, Michael Palmer and Amarius Harris who were members of the Leeward Islands U19 team.
