Narine Bidhesi hits record century

Narine Bidhesi played a captain’s knock and showed that there is no substitute for experience yesterday when he rescued W-Connection Wanderers from disaster with his inspirational century in their Carib National Cricket League fourth round match against PowerGen Sports at Syne Village. Having been sent in by the homesters after they won the toss, Wanderers were tottering at 61 for three when Bidhesi did a massive rescue act and shared three significant partnerships with Joel Pamphille, Ken Mason and Param Rampersad.

Gibran Mohammed was the only other batsman to show some spunk with an attractive 42 (6 x4s) off 59 balls. Bidhesi, a 40-year-old batted for 225 minutes and he stroked nine fours off 180 balls to reach his 13th Division One century but more importantly he steered his 100. He dominated all the partnerships and showed his younger counterparts how to master spin bowling on a helpful track. The right-handed Bidhesi faced TT’s national senior spin trio of Mohammed, Amit Jaggernauth and Rishi Bachan.

He featured in a 68-run fourth wicket partnership with Joel Pamphille (26), 75-run fifth wicket partnership with Mason (22) and 50-run sixth wicket stand with Rampersad (16). Wanderers folded up in dramatic fashion on his dismissal at 225, losing their last four wickets for an addition of only 15 runs. Mohammed emerged as the leading wicket-taker with four for 61 from 22.1 overs while Bachan grabbed two wickets for 42 Jaggernauth managed a solitary wicket for 44 runs. In reply, PowerGen were in trouble at 55 for four wickets at the end of the first day’s play.

Summarise scores —

At Syne Village: W-CONNECTION WANDERERS 239 (Narine Bidhesi 100, Looknath Ramsuchit 42, Joel Pamphille 26, Keno Mason 22, Param Rampersad 16; Dave Mohammed 4 for 61, Rishi Bachan 2 for 42) vs PowerGen SPORTS 55 for 4 (Gibran Mohammed 28 not out, Jason Mohammed 20; Sanjeev Gooljar 2 for 16).
At Wilson Road: ALESCON COMET 261 all out (Travis Dowlin 76, Avidesh Samaroo 58 not out, Rayad Emrit 26; Mukesh Persad 5 for 94, Damodar Daesrath 2 for 53) vs FCB CLARKE ROAD 54 for 2 (Gregory Mahabir 19; Rayad Emrit 2 for 9).
At Diego Martin: QP 273 (Kierron Pollard 58, Justin Guillen 43, Deepak Kumar 36, Ricardo Paty 30, Mervyn Dillon 36; Ryan Best 5 for 28, Ken Hazel 2 for 51) vs CERAMIC MERRY BOYS 58 for 3 (Mario Belcon 26, Lincoln Roberts 18 not out, Aneil Kanhai 9 not out).
At Inshan Ali Park: CLICO PREYSAL 214 (Denesh Ramdin 78, Andy Jackson 44, Satish Naidoo 36; Devindra Krishna 4 for 82, Lennox Cush 3 for 36) vs TILE IT CENTRAL SPORTS 97 for 4 (Lennox Cush 58 not out, Sanjeev Maharaj 2 n.o.).