WI Championship heads for nailbiting finish

PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC):

THE FINAL round of the 2025 West Indies Championship is set to be a humdinger starting today with the top two teams, the Guyana Harpy Eagles and the Trinidad and Tobago Red Force, facing off in a title decider at Queen’s Park Oval.

With just 6.2 points separating the sides, the showdown will determine who lifts the coveted regional first-class trophy.

Guyana, with 111.6 points, remain unbeaten after six rounds, but, right on their tails are Trinidad and Tobago with 105.4, having lost just once to Jamaica last week on home soil.

A win for the Red Force could see them leapfrog the Harpy Eagles, while Guyana will aim to maintain their dominance with another strong performance.

Harpy Eagles captain Tevin Imlach says his team will be going out to get the job done, despite playing away.

“We’re going into the game looking to win the match, and that’s the idea around it. Obviously, first innings is going to be key, and getting that first innings lead is going to be big.”

Red Force captain, Joshua Da Silva, knows all too well the importance of the clash, and he and his troops are keen to break the long drought for a four-day title.

“We knew the last game of the season was going to be a straight shootout, it’s like a final. We know where we went wrong and what happened in that last game against Jamaica, and we have to put that behind us and just try and not let those things happen again. In training today, everybody is happy and ready to go again, excited for this clash,” said Da Silva.

The Red Force-Harpy Eagles clash will also see the tournament’s top two run scorers going head-to-head, with Jason Mohammed leading all batters with 552 runs, including three centuries. Kevlon Anderson from the Harpy Eagles has been equally impressive, scoring 522 runs this season.

The battle of the left-arm spinners will also be on show, as the competition’s leading wicket-taker Khary Pierre, of T&T, with 37 scalps, will go up against Veerasammy Permaul, of the Harpy Eagles, who has 28 wickets.

Meanwhile, Barbados Pride, with 100 points and the Leeward Islands Hurricanes, 92.1, remain outside contenders, but their clash at Warner Park could decide third place. The Hurricanes must win to keep their slim title hopes alive, while Barbados will look to finish strong.

In other matches, fifth-placed Jamaica Scorpions will look to close out the competition on a high when they face last-placed Combined Campuses and Colleges at the Sir Frank Worrell Memorial Ground, St Augustine, while the Windward Islands Volcanoes in sixth place will tackle seventh-placed West Indies Academy at Coolidge in Antigua.