West Indies batsman Rovman Powell lashed a 15-ball half-century – the fastest this season and second fastest in Lanka Premier League history – but his Kandy Warriors crashed to their third straight defeat after going down by 14 runs to Jayden Seales’s Jaffna Kings on Wednesday.
In a game reduced to 14 overs per side due to rain, Warriors failed to overhaul their DLS-revised target of 181 at the R Premadasa Stadium, despite the right-handed Powell’s amazing 61 off just 19 deliveries, ending on 166 for five.
He put on 81 for the second wicket with fellow Jamaican Kennar Lewis whose 41 from 36 balls also underpinned an opening stand of 64 with Charith Asalanka who blasted a 19-ball 42.
Gifted West Indies seamer Jayden Seales continued his excellent wicket-taking in his first-ever overseas T20 tournament with two for 40 from three overs, to lift his tally to seven wickets from three matches.
Earlier, Kings raced to 181 for six from their allotted overs thanks to Avishka Fernando and captain Thisara Perera, both of whom pummeled 53.
Afghan Rahmanullah Gurbaz fell cheaply for eight in the second over with the score on 15 and in-form Englishman Tom Kohler-Cadmore followed for 14 in the fifth with 32 on the board.
But Fernando belted seven sixes in a 23-ball cameo and Perera joined in with two fours and half-dozen sixes off 21 deliveries, the pair putting on a rollicking 105 for the third wicket.
Needing to score at nearly 13 an over, Warriors received the perfect start with Lewis clobbering three fours and two sixes and Asalanka, five fours and two sixes in a robust partnership.
When Asalanka fell at the end of the sixth over, Powell arrived to sustain the tempo, launching two fours and seven sixes in an entertaining innings – his final one for Warriors before joining up with the West Indies squad on the tour of Pakistan starting next week.
Rovman Powell combined with Lewis to plunder 22 runs from Seales’s second over and the tenth of the innings, before smashing 19 from the next over sent down by leg-spinner Hasaranga de Silva.
His dismissal, however, yorked by veteran fast bowler Suranga Lakmal in the next over, erased Warriors’ hopes of overhauling their target, especially after Seales rebounded to remove Lewis and Kamindu Mendis (9) within the space of three deliveries in the penultimate over.
CMC
