Manchester, St Mary to contest Kingston Wharves U15 final

Manchester and defending champions St Mary will contest next week’s final of the Kingston Wharves U15 cricket competition following easy semifinal wins over Kensington and Kingston, respectively.

On Thursday, Manchester made light work of hosts Kensington and cruised to an eight-wicket win.

With overnight rain forcing a late start to the contest, that didn’t seem to perturb Manchester who won the toss and decided to send in the home side on a soft pitch.

That decision proved critical as the Kensington batters had no answer and were blown away for a mere 26 runs in 14.2 overs with player of the match Demario Hall bagging three wickets for eight runs.

Hall then returned with the bat and hit a brisk unbeaten 22 from 32 balls to ease Manchester to 29 for two in 9.4 overs.

Winning captain Hall was happy his team did the business swiftly to give them more time to prepare for what is expected to be a very competitive final.

“We did our best to try and bowl them out as quickly as possible and we did just that. We were fast in the field and keeping them under pressure and we executed our plans to perfection.”

Hall and his team will square off with the defending champions St Mary who made light work of Kingston during their semifinal yesterday at Nelson Oval.

31 FROM 51 BALLS

Kingston won the toss and took the first strike and could only manage to get 68 runs with Giovanni Grey leading the way with a fighting 31 from 51 balls which included three fours.

Grey would be the only batter to get into double figures as Shavaughn Boyd bagged four wickets for 22 runs with National player Tyson Gordon Jr picking up three wickets for just five runs.

St Mary cruised to a nine-wicket victory at 70 for one in 12.2 overs. Opener Tyreece Saunders stroked an aggressive 29 from 23 balls with two fours while Devante Miller made an unbeaten 22 from 26 deliveries with two fours and a six.

Gordon Jr was not out on 16 from 25 balls with one boundary.

St Mary’s captain Jiovanni Richardson says an all-around team effort did the trick for his team.

“We have a good all-round team and we came to Kingston and did well with both ball and bat. We have some things that we need to get right in the final and we hope to fix those things and execute to beat Manchester,” Richardson said.