Tridents through to playoffs with dramatic win over Kingsmen

The Kingsmen are also into the knockouts despite the loss

Tridents 151 for 8 (Descarte 56*, King 18; Hunain 2-25) beat Kingsmen 150 for 9 (Sadaqat 47, Khan 18; J Pollard 3-38) by 2 wickets

Gudakesh Motie helped the Barbados Tridents smash 17 runs from the final over against the Jamaica Kingsmen to secure a dramatic win and a place in the Caribbean Premier League knockout stages on Saturday.

Coming in at No. 9, Motie slashed Odean Smith for four over point before taking him for a straight six in the first two legal balls. The under-pressure Smith gave up a couple of extras, leaving the Tridents needing just a single off the final delivery of the game for victory.

Motie earlier took 2 for 7 from three overs to halt momentum on the Kingsmen, who had already qualified, to 150 for 9. Shadrack Descarte’s 56 (42 balls) set up the chase towards the back end of the Tridents’ innings before Motie’s final-over heroics.

The Kingsmen had a solid foundation batting first, scoring 50 for 1 in the first six overs.

Maaz Sadaqat set the platform with 47 at the top of the order before Motie removed him with the Kingsmen at 86 for 3 in the 12th. The experienced middle-order couldn’t find anything more than brief cameos from Andre Russell (10 from 4), Hassan Khan (16 from 12) and Keacy Carty (15 from 7).

It was the reverse story for Tridents on home turf, however. They lost three wickets inside the powerplay and were left needing close to 12 runs per over for the majority of the latter half of the innings.

Descarte’s (56 from 42) only two sixes were perfectly timed in a crucial 15th over, which he took for 16 runs to keep the hosts' fight alive. 

In the final over, it was Motie who took his team to victory, which propelled them to third in the standings.

Despite the defeat, the Kingsmen also made the playoffs as the fourth-place team thanks to having a superior net run rate to the Saint Lucia Kings.