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By Peter Della Penna in Fort Lauderdale, Florida

Official Scorecard I Ball-by-ball commentary

West Indies U-19 captain Kraigg Brathwaite made the most of three reprieves to score 122 not out as his side defeated USA U-19 by 215 runs Saturday afternoon at the Central Broward Regional Park in Lauderhill, Florida. Braithwaite was dropped on 1 and 51 and survived a missed stumping on 117, three of six genuine chances that USA failed to convert in the field.

The match started 64 minutes late as the teams waited for morning thundershowers to clear. When they finally did, West Indies won the toss and elected to bat first, sending Brathwaite and John Campbell to open. On the first ball of the fifth over with the score 17 for 0, USA committed the first of five drops as Brathwaite chased a short and wide delivery from Salman Ahmad and sliced it straight to gully where Hammad Shahid spilled a straightforward chance. Brathwaite continued to bide his time, reaching 1 off 24 balls before he started to get comfortable.

Image (right) - West Indiest U-19 captain Kraigg Brathwaite and USA U-19 captain Greg Sewdial shake hands at the coin toss before the first match of their four-match series in Florida. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket]

“At first as an opening batsman I had to assess the pitch because I’ve never played here before,” said Brathwaite. “The ball wasn’t really bouncing and the fellas were bowling a good line. The ball that I got dropped off, it was fairly wide. So I decided just to try to get through this period. It was tough, but it would get easier. As I bat longer it would get easier so I decided just to fight through it despite the drop.” 

USA made their first breakthrough six balls later when Shahid had Campbell caught driving to Mital Patel at mid on for 13. The next wicket fell at 65 in the 15th over when Shayan Abdulghani had Kieron Joseph stumped for 17.

However, USA’s energy in the field was drained by the 20th over on a humid 90 degree day. After seeing off solid new ball spells from Shahid and Ahmad, Brathwaite and Sunil Ambris ground USA into submission with a 121-run third wicket stand.

“It wasn’t swinging a lot, but it was swinging just a tad, just a little, but the wicket wasn’t really bouncing,” said Brathwaite. “The outfield wasn’t that fast. Not a lot of boundaries were being scored so you really had to push for the singles.” Brathwaite only had two fours and a six in his knock. He brought up his 50 in 83 balls and just one run later with the score on 128, he was dropped for the second time as Cameron Mirza’s leaping effort at long on wound up knocking the ball over for a maximum.

Ambris was put down on 50 with the score at 159 as Pranay Suri couldn’t hold on to a low diving effort at cover. He hung around until he had reached 67 before he was bowled by a yorker in Ahmad’s second spell. It sparked a mini collapse for the Windies as three more wickets fell in the space of 24 runs to set the team back to 219 for 6 in the 42nd over.

Brathwaite was still going strong though and brought up his 100 in 130 balls with a two on the first ball of the 44th over, showing no visible signs of wearing down in the heat. A few more wickets fell late, but not before two more drops and a missed stumping took place. For the second time on the day, a drop turned into a six as number 10 batsman Steven Katwaroo hit Shahid to long on where Amarnauth Persaud misjudged the ball before letting it go through both hands over his head and over the rope with five balls to go in the innings.

Image (right) - Kraigg Brathwaite walks off the field after batting through all 50 overs to finish on 122*. [Courtesy: Peter Della Penna/DreamCricket]

The final miscue was a microcosm of USA’s sloppy fielding throughout the day in which they cost themselves, by a conservative estimate, 35 runs in dropped catches and misfields. As a result, West Indies finished at 278 for 8 in their 50 overs.

“As far as our fielding, we dropped six catches today which was obviously vital. Hopefully next game we can bounce back, take our catches and make some more runs,” said USA U-19 captain Greg Sewdial. “We definitely don’t go out there to drop catches and misfield. We try to give our best, 100%, all of the players out there. As far as the dropped catches, as the saying goes, catches win matches.”

USA’s chase never got going. Their highest partnership was 13 runs and extras wound up being the top score with 15. First change left-arm spin bowler Derone Davis entered the attack in the 11th over and suffocated USA by bowling four maidens in a row. At the other end, Kyle Mayers was the chief destroyer for the Windies, taking 5 for 17 in his six overs which wiped out USA’s middle order. After leg-spinner Donovan Nelson claimed two wickets, Davis finished off the match with his first scalp to end with figures of 10-6-14-1. USA was bowled out for 63 in 29 overs. Only Sewdial and Shahid crossed double digits with the bat.

“This four day tournament was meant for us to gradually improve as quickly and as efficiently as possible,” said Sewdial. “Today we didn’t give our best effort in the field. It could have been from lack of physical fitness. It could have been from lack of concentration. It could have been from anything but our job is to come back tomorrow, discuss the things that went wrong today and some of the things that went right, try to correct those mistakes and come back tomorrow strong.”