The 2024 CPL has been a roller­coast­er ride, filled with nail-bit­ing fin­ish­es, un­ex­pect­ed up­sets, and a few teams that seem to be stuck in a loop of dis­ap­point­ment. The tour­na­ment has lived up to its rep­u­ta­tion for dra­ma, twists, and the oc­ca­sion­al comedic blun­der. With the Trin­ba­go Knight Rid­ers (TKR) tak­ing on the Guyana Ama­zon War­riors (GAW) lat­er to­day, the game promis­es to be a thrilling en­counter, and it should come as no sur­prise that the Queen’s Park Oval is sold out. As the tour­na­ment nears its cli­max, let’s dive in­to the high­lights and low­lights of this year’s CPL thus far and ‘cov­er’ each team in the tour­na­ment. 

An­tigua & Bar­bu­da Fal­cons: A Tale of Near Miss­es

The An­tigua & Bar­bu­da Fal­cons (ABF) have epit­o­mised heart­break this sea­son. The ABF lost both of their open­ing games against the St. Kitts and Nevis Pa­tri­ots (SKNP) and the GAW on the very last ball, and if they had won those games, the stand­ings would have tak­en a to­tal­ly dif­fer­ent com­plex­ion.

Los­ing match­es by the nar­row­est of mar­gins is a cru­el fate, and the Fal­cons have en­dured it with a straight face that be­lies their frus­tra­tion. In­stead of the ABF hav­ing 8 points, they are strug­gling on 4, with the play­offs look­ing like a rather dis­tant hope in­stead of a dis­tinct re­al­i­ty.

Look­ing at the AFB squad, they have some ex­cel­lent play­ers who have played for the Ja­maica Tallawahs, but, in gen­er­al, their bat­ting has been as re­li­able as a politi­cian’s promise. Get­ting scores of 163, 168, 145, 142, and 176 was a tes­ta­ment to ABF’s bowl­ing at­tack to get these games in­to the last de­liv­ery of the 20 overs.

To score 176 and de­feat the pow­er­ful TKR’s bat­ting line­up by 6 runs in­di­cat­ed the bowl­ing at­tack of Mo­ham­mad Amir, Chris Green, Imad Wasim, Shamar Springer, Fabi­an Allen, and Roshon Primus could have won games if their bat­ting had not been as de­pend­able as a house of cards in a hur­ri­cane and giv­en them more runs to de­fend. Bran­don King was a huge miss for them for most of the tour­na­ment.

They will be bet­ter next year with one or two bat­ting re­cruits, but I think they will have to watch the play­offs from the side­lines. Per­haps a bat­ting coach spe­cial­is­ing in calm­ing nerves could be their se­cret weapon next sea­son.

St Kitts and Nevis Pa­tri­ots (SKNP): A Ti­tan­ic Dis­as­ter

SKNP, yet again, has been a dis­as­ter of Ti­tan­ic pro­por­tions, sink­ing in­to the depths of medi­oc­rity. Af­ter win­ning the first game on the last ball, I thought that would have giv­en them the im­pe­tus to go on to bet­ter things, as I had in­di­cat­ed they may have been the team to fight the St Lu­cia Kings (SLK) for that fi­nal play­off spot. As it stands now, like last year, they may on­ly win one game. I do not com­pre­hend how a team with the tal­ent of Evin Lewis, Kyle May­ers, An­dre Fletch­er, An­rich Nort­je, Wanin­du Hasaranga, and Veerasam­my Per­maul, just to name a few, can on­ly win 1 game out of 7 thus far.

With a ros­ter filled with such tal­ent­ed play­ers, it’s a mys­tery that would baf­fle even Sher­lock Holmes as to how they’ve man­aged to achieve so lit­tle. I be­lieve the team’s plan­ning is not good enough, as the days of just go­ing out there and play­ing are over. One can re­mem­ber when Dwayne Bra­vo left TKR to go and cap­tain the SKNP, and they won the tour­na­ment. It came down to good lead­er­ship—know­ing your play­ers and the op­po­si­tion. SKNP needs a prop­er over­haul of the ve­hi­cle; the en­gine is dead, the bat­tery is cor­rod­ed, and it is past time to get new me­chan­ics.

The St Lu­cia Kings: Time to Be Crowned?

The SLK is one of my favourite teams sim­ply be­cause the best and smartest tac­ti­cian leads them in the tour­na­ment, Faf du Plessis. The Kings have been a thorn in the side of many teams with their ex­plo­sive bat­ting, but their bowl­ing of­ten feels like a leaky faucet that can­not stop the flow of runs.

I still think they lack one qual­i­ty bats­man in their mid­dle or­der be­cause if Du Plessis and John­son Charles go ear­ly, they strug­gle to get to 175 runs, al­though their in­ex­pe­ri­ence in their bowl­ing let them down against TKR. On an­oth­er note, I can­not un­der­stand how Khary Pierre is not com­mand­ing a reg­u­lar place in the team, es­pe­cial­ly when they played TKR, as he knows their play­ers well.

They have a match­win­ner in Noor Ah­mad, but one or two oth­er bowlers will have to come to the par­ty, and even though they will like­ly get to the play­offs, I still be­lieve they may have to wait an­oth­er year to win their first CPL ti­tle. 

The Bar­ba­dos Roy­als: The Dark Hors­es

The Bar­ba­dos Roy­als (BR) have qui­et­ly emerged as a dan­ger­ous force to be reck­oned with. They have a tremen­dous all-round squad. Quin­ton de Kock rep­re­sents class at the top of the or­der. Once he gets go­ing, the op­po­si­tion is fac­ing a to­tal of 175 plus, and add Al­ick Athanaze, David Miller, Rov­man Pow­ell, and Ja­son Hold­er to the bat­ting, and they are more than ca­pa­ble.

The key for the op­po­si­tion is to get de Kock out ear­ly. Their bowl­ing is stronger than their bat­ting, as could be seen when TKR strug­gled to get over the line, chas­ing 157 for vic­to­ry. Spin­ners Ma­heesh Theek­shana and Ke­shav Ma­haraj are world-class, and when the seam­ers Naveen ul Haq, Obed Mc Coy, and Hold­er (who was aw­ful vs. TKR) get it right, teams will have dif­fi­cul­ty scor­ing against them. If they bring their A-game to the play­offs, they could spring a sur­prise against the ‘Big 2’.

The Trin­ba­go Knight Rid­ers: Peak­ing At The Right Time?

TKR, the 4-time cham­pi­ons, haven’t, in my view, played their best all-round­ed game thus far. They’ve shown glimpses of their for­mer dom­i­nance, but con­sis­ten­cy has been an is­sue. It’s like they’re play­ing a game of pok­er, bluff­ing their way to vic­to­ry. I thought com­pla­cen­cy set in against ABF, and they paid the price, but I don’t think that will hap­pen again for the rest of the tour­na­ment. They al­so pos­sess an ex­cel­lent all-round team. Any fran­chise with Nicholas Pooran and Sunil Nar­ine in it must be strong favourites to win.

Waqar Salamkheil is bowl­ing bet­ter than ever, and Akeal Ho­sein is his usu­al steady self. The pac­ers at the mo­ment are leak­ing runs. In the bat­ting de­part­ment, one or two bats­men at the top need to take the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and bat deep. If they can find their rhythm and avoid com­pla­cen­cy, they’ll be a tough team to beat. The re­al test for the TKR will come lat­er to­day when they face the GAW, which will go a long way in de­ter­min­ing the strengths of the two teams.

The Guyana Ama­zon War­riors: Back-To-Back Cham­pi­ons?

The GAW are the oth­er favourite team, but are they good enough to de­fend their ti­tle? The War­riors have been a peren­ni­al con­tender in the CPL, and I hon­est­ly think they can de­fend their ti­tle. Play­ing the last leg at home will give them a lot of con­fi­dence. They bat deep, but they will miss the in­flu­ence of Rah­man­ul­lah Gur­baz; how­ev­er, the form of Shim­ron Het­my­er is en­cour­ag­ing. He looks as if he wants to rekin­dle his ca­reer, as it was on a down­ward spi­ral, and he seems de­ter­mined to mark the 2024 CPL with some dev­as­tat­ing in­nings. Shai Hope, on his day, is bril­liant, and the ad­di­tion of Moeen Ali will add more depth to the bat­ting and bowl­ing. How­ev­er, they’ll need to watch out for the un­ex­pect­ed twists and turns that the CPL has be­come fa­mous for.

There is not much to choose be­tween the TKR, GAW, and the BR, and on their day, they can each de­feat one an­oth­er. It is at this point that all the teams have to be play­ing their best crick­et, as one bad game can be the cat­a­lyst for down­fall. I am sure TKR re­mem­bers the fi­nal last year, but with these 3 teams so close in abil­i­ty, it au­gurs well for a great cli­max to the 2024 CPL fi­nals, and may the best team win.

Who will that be? Well, your guess is as good as mine. As the tour­na­ment reach­es its con­clu­sion, we can on­ly hope that the fi­nal will be a fit­ting end to a sea­son that has kept us on the edge of our seats. En­joy!