Ramdass hits second hundred

NEW AMSTERDAM: Ryan Ramdass with his first century on home soil yesterday and his second in consecutive innings left Guyana in a comfortable position at 254 for four when stumps were drawn on the opening day of their sixth round match in the Carib Beer Series regional tournament against Trinidad and Tobago. After scores of 57 and 144 not out against Barbados in the previous round, Ramdass followed up his maiden First-Class century with a purposeful 112, and alongside left-hander Narsingh Deonarine, who made 59, added 127 for the third wicket. The two stonewalled the TT bowlers for close to over three hours, following the cheap loss of opener Sewnarine Chattergoon for three and West Indies batsman Ramnaresh Sarwan for 19, after Guyana won the toss and chose to bat.

Another significant partnership could be in the making between Guyana captain Shivnarine Chanderpaul, who is not out on 32, and Assad Fudadin, who has toiled for two hours for his 20 not out. In the day’s third over, Richard Kelly found Chattergoon playing no shot and got him leg before wicket, but then Sarwan came in and batted with fluency until his first miscued shot. Sarwan, playing his first match since returning from West Indies’ trip to the VB Series in Australia, was caught at square leg by his West Indies teammate Dwayne Bravo running and diving from first slip to hang on to another of his now customary stunning catches off Jaggernauth to leave Guyana 54 for two.

There were no further successes for TT until the third ball after tea when Deonarine barely shaved one outside off stump for wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin to hang on to a catch just above his boots off Jaggernauth. Ramdass and Deonarine had moved the score to 181 by pushing the ball into the gaps for singles and being merciless on the occasional deliveries served up for treatment. The pair went to lunch on 55 and 18 respectively, Ramdass eventually got to 50, after showing some nerves in the 40s. After the interval both played, primarily on the front foot on a typically low Albion Sports Complex pitch devoid of grass and pace. Deonarine reached 50 with five fours, but from 107 deliveries.

He went to tea on 59 and did not progress further after the interval, while Ramdass, who again showed clear signs of nervousness and inexperience of scoring big at this level, was dropped just before tea on 91 with the score 179 for two. Reyad Emrit, who opened the bowling alongside Kelly, induced a thick edge from an attempted cover drive, but Ramdin could not hang on after barely getting the tips of the glove to the ball. Ramdass had a second chance on 96, when another drive ricocheted from Daren Ganga’s foot at silly mid-off back to the bowler, but Jaggernauth, though diving forward, failed to keep the ball in his grasp.

Eventually, Ramdass smashed a back-foot extra cover drive and moved to his hundred with his 10th boundary. Not long after he launched a booming six over Jaggernauth’s head, he tried to repeat the shot in the 71st over of the day off the same bowler, miscued and skied to mid-off, where debutant Imran Khan (not your humble correspondent) ensured the circumspect, but invaluable innings came to an end. Ramdass batted just under five hours, faced 216 balls and hit 11 fours and one six. Jaggernauth’s 29 overs cost 82 runs, but most importantly for the Trinidadians he bagged three of the four wickets to go down so far. (CMC)