In a sur­pris­ing and an­ti­cli­mac­tic con­clu­sion to an oth­er­wise thrilling CG Unit­ed Su­per50 Cup 2024, both fi­nal­ists, Bar­ba­dos Pride and Ja­maica Scor­pi­ons, failed to take the field for the fi­nal, lead­ing to a dou­ble for­feit and the de­ci­sion to de­clare no cham­pi­on for this year’s com­pe­ti­tion.

Crick­et West In­dies (CWI) of­fi­cial­ly an­nounced that, due to the for­fei­ture, there would be no ti­tle award­ed for the tour­na­ment. The de­ci­sion fol­lowed a rain-af­fect­ed match day on Sat­ur­day that ren­dered the con­di­tions too dif­fi­cult to play un­der.

As a re­sult, the an­tic­i­pat­ed prize mon­ey of US$100,000 for the cham­pi­ons and US$50,000 for the run­ners-up will re­main un­claimed. Both se­mi-fi­nal­ists, who were set to earn US$25,000 each, will still re­ceive their prize mon­ey.

The fi­nal had been sched­uled for a 1 pm lo­cal start , but scat­tered show­ers be­gan around mid­day, de­lay­ing play. The ground was deemed un­fit for play, forc­ing an in­def­i­nite de­lay. Match ref­er­ee Re­on King, in con­sul­ta­tion with the um­pir­ing team, set the lat­est pos­si­ble start time for 6.17 pm, at which point the match would have been re­duced to a 20-overs-per-side for­mat.

Un­der the tour­na­ment’s play­ing con­di­tions, if no play was pos­si­ble, or if the match was aban­doned or end­ed in a tie, both teams would be de­clared co-win­ners. By 5.45 pm, the of­fi­ci­at­ing team deemed the con­di­tions safe enough to pro­ceed with play, and the toss was sched­uled for 6 pm.

How­ev­er, de­spite con­fir­ma­tion from the um­pires and match ref­er­ee that the sit­u­a­tion was safe for play, nei­ther team’s cap­tain showed up for the toss. As the clock ticked past the lat­est per­mis­si­ble start time of 6.17 pm, both teams ef­fec­tive­ly for­feit­ed the match, and the fi­nal was called off.

Ear­li­er in the tour­na­ment, Bar­ba­dos Pride had earned their place in the fi­nal with a dom­i­nant vic­to­ry over the de­fend­ing cham­pi­ons, Trinidad and To­ba­go Red Force. Ja­maica Scor­pi­ons had ad­vanced by de­feat­ing the Lee­ward Is­lands Hur­ri­canes in their se­mi-fi­nal.

CMC