Despite not claiming 3rd straight title: U17 captain praises team effort

TT Under-17 captain Antonio Gomez, says his team was disappointed not to win a third consecutive title in the Cricket West Indies Regional Under-17 50-over competition but praised his teammates for fighting until the end.

Barbados ended the tournament with 20.6 points, TT finished second with 20.5 points and Guyana ended third on 19.2. Barbados won the title as they earned more fast bowling points during the tournament getting 16 fast bowling wickets compared to TT’s 15. Each wicket taken by a fast bowler earns his team .1 of a point.

Antonio Morris of Barbados got the best batsman award, after scoring the most runs with 194 and was voted the MVP for the tournament. Tariq Newman of the Leeward Islands emerged the best bowler with nine wickets. Leonardo Julien of TT and Yeudister Persaud of Guyana shared the honours of most dismissals by a wicketkeeper by getting six dismissals each.

At the prize giving ceremony at the National Aquatic Centre, Couva, on Tuesday night Gomez said, “We were quite disappointed, because we were hoping to retain the title for a third time, but tough luck to the fellas. We played good cricket, we had a few bad decisions but all that is in the game.”

Going into the last round TT, Barbados and Guyana were all in with a great chance of winning the title. Despite TT defeating Leeward Islands by five wickets, Barbados edged TT on points with a six-wicket win over Guyana.

Gomez praised his team, especially his bowlers for a solid tournament saying, “The bowlers especially did their job, coming back in the last game especially picking up eight fast bowling points. That was well done by the boys and they gave us a chance and brought us back into the competition. Everybody had each other’s back and we kept supporting and we still had belief we could win this tournament.” TT played with an extra fast bowler in the last round in an effort to get as many fast bowling points as possible.

Gomez said he was satisfied with how he captained the team, but improvements can be made. “I did pretty okay. It was my first time captaining a national side. I made a few errors, but I learnt from my mistakes and hopefully I come out stronger next time.”

The TT captain said a number of his teammates made strong claims to the selectors leading up to the Under-19 World Cup in 2020.