Tony Becca, Contributing Editor
THE PRELIMINARY round of the Jamaica Cricket Association's Supreme Ventures Super Cup cricket competition ended on Sunday with Melbourne, St. Catherine CC, Jamaica Defence Force and Kensington taking the top four places.
After nine matches each, Melbourne finished number one with 32 points, followed by St. Catherine with 30, JDF with 27 and Kensington with 23.
In a close finish for the fourth spot, Manchester also ended with 23 points but after the head-to-head clash had ended in a no result due to rain, Manchester were pushed aside by Kensington who won two matches to Manchester's one.
In this weekend's semi-finals, it will be Melbourne versus Kensing-ton at Melbourne Oval, St. Catherine versus JDF at Chedwin Park or Up Park Camp, and after an interesting preliminary round, it should be quite a battle for a place in the final.
Going into the semis as the leaders after pocketing three victories and four first innings leads, Melbourne must be fancied to put away Kensington who finished nine points behind them, and in the other semi-final, it should be St. Catherine over JDF.
While St. Catherine, with three victories, three first innings leads and three first innings losses, deserve to be tipped to move on ahead of JDF who finished with two victories, four innings leads and three first innings losses - including one against St. Catherine, the standings, the points difference between the two teams as far as the Melbourne/Kensington match-up is concerned, may be misleading.
Despite their impressive statistics, Melbourne played to one no-result - against Kensington in a high-scoring contest. In finishing with two victories, two first innings leads and two first innings losses, however, Kensington, suffered two other no-results.
What is important is that those two no-results were not due to high scores. Those two no-results were due to rain, and although it did not appear they were heading that way, as far as their fans are concerned, with a little luck, Kensington could have won five points more on each occasion and could therefore have finished top of the standings with 33 points.
The four teams in the semi-finals are evenly matched, that means the teams in each of the semi-finals are evenly matched, and this weekend's shutout should be close with the Melbourne/ Kensing-ton clash expected to be decided by the batsmen on either side.
Going into the last set of matches in the preliminary round, Melbourne, St. Catherine and JDF were already through to the semi-finals with Kensington, Manchester and Lucas fighting for the fourth spot.
As it turned out, Kensington defeated St. Elizabeth, Manchester led JDF on first innings but failed to win the match, Lucas dropped first innings points to Melbourne, and Kensington squeezed into the last four.
After recovering to score 222 and nailing JDF for 103, Manchester must be very disappointed that they fell short, and after a truly brilliant performance, Chadwick Walton of Munro must be disappointed that he received no support from the Lucas batsmen when it mattered.
In one of the best innings of the season, in a display of powerful drives, pulls and cuts, in a performance that suggested talent beyond the ordinary, young Walton, who went to bat at 16 for one and left at 154 for six after batting for 127 minutes and facing 95 deliveries, smashed 13 fours and four sixes while scoring 100 out of Lucas' paltry 192.
It is a pity that Walton is not in the semi-finals. It is good, however, to know that there is a batsman like him around.
