Tony Becca - FROM THE BOUNDARY JAMAICA'S bid for a winning finish to the Carib Beer Series ended in disappointment in Barbados when, after dominating the action on the first two days, they failed to follow through and were beaten so easily that the match was over long before lunch on the fourth day.
After dismissing Barbados for 142 and easing to 135 for two, Jamaica lost control of the match on two occasions.
Firstly, on the second day when they failed to bat themselves into an impregnable position and ended up leading by only 116 runs; and on the third morning when, with Barbados on 149 for five and leading by only 33 runs with Floyd Reifer batting and only Courtney Browne as a recognised batsman to come, they dropped four catches in the space of an hour.
Reifer, who scored 83 and won the Man of the Match award, was dropped at 19, 19 and 33, and night watchman Corey Collymore, who batted for 90 minutes was dropped at five.
Looking back at a match during which both sides suffered from some embarrassingly poor decisions by the umpires and during which captain Christopher Gayle embarrassed Jamaica with his prolonged protest when an appeal for a catch against Reifer in the second innings was turned down, Jamaica, however, probably made a vital mistake even before the toss was spun.
The pitch, so covered with grass that it looked like the tennis courts of Wimbledon, was ideal for pace bowlers and instead of going into the match with two fast bowlers supported by a medium-paced allrounder and two spin bowlers, Jamaica should have gone in with three fast bowlers - Andrew Richardson, Daren Powell and Evon McInnis, one medium-pacer, allrounder David Bernard Jnr., and one spin bowler, offspinner Nehemiah Perry.
The pitch was such that it was obvious it would have assisted pace bowling, that it would have assisted offspin bowling more than right-arm legspin bowling, and that is why McInnis should have played over one of the spin bowlers and why Perry, as he was, should have been selected over Odean Brown.
As well as Brown bowled at Alpart, McInnis would have been a better bet than Brown who did not bowl in the first innings even though Gayle bowled 13 overs and who, after not bowling one ball until Barbados were 226 for six after 80 overs, bowled only eight overs in the second innings.
In fact, a fast bowler who gets the ball to skid onto the batsman and who sometimes gets it to bounce sharply, McInnis probably would have been the ideal bowler on the North Star pitch.
In lamenting the team's failure to win the match and take home the Carib Beer International Challenge Trophy, however, Jamaicans should say congratulations to Barbados, who, after winning all seven matches in the preliminary rounds for a perfect 84 points, ended the season with eight victories and one first innings lead and thoroughly deserve to be double champions.
On top of that, it should be remembered that Jamaica won only three matches in the preliminary rounds, that while they finished second to Barbados in the Carib Beer Cup, they were a distant 32 points behind, and that by coming back to defeat Jamaica at Sabina Park after losing first innings points, by coming to defeat Jamaica at North Star after trailing on first innings, Barbados demonstrated the mettle of champions.
