Swashbuckling Hetmyer leads Warriors to six wicket win
The Guyana Amazon Warriors began their 2018 HERO Caribbean Premier League (CPL) Season with a sixwicket win with 21 balls to spare over the St. Kitts and Nevis Patriots, last evening in front of a packed house of boisterous supporters at the National Stadium at Providence.
The Warriors, feeding off of a marvellous knock of 79 not out from West Indies top order batsman and home town favourite, Shimron Hetmyer, raced to 148-4 from 16.3 overs in reply to the Patriots’ total of 146-5, after his skipper Shoaib Malik, won the toss and opted to bowl.
Warriors, in their chase of the average total on the flat track, were rocked with the early losses of Luke Ronchi, who was bowled by Sheldon Cottrell for a second ball duck in the first over, and his fellow opener, Chadwick Walton, who departed two balls later, to Nepalese spinner, Sadeep Lamichhamie.
Skipper Malik lasted only nine deliveries for his quick fire knock of 14, but Hetmyer and Jason Mohammed steered the innings into the safety zone, with a partnership of 62 from 40 balls. Hetmyer, a natural aggressor, smashed 43 of those runs, including two boundaries and one six from the 20-run fifth over delivered by Alzarri Joseph.
Hetmyer followed up with another huge over; this time clobbering Anton Devcich for 16 runs to swing the match back in favour of the home town Warriors.
Despite the loss of Mohammed, Hetmyer stood tall, and worked a short one off the hips for a couple to bring up his half century from 29 balls. With Mohammed back in the shed, lesser known, South African born Australian resident, Chris Green then shared in a 62-run stand with Hetmyer to take the Warriors home.
Hetmyer, who took a liking to Ben Cutting, carted 15 runs off of the 16th over to leave the Warriors just seven
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