Kevin Sin­clair, Leon John­son, and An­tho­ny Bram­ble got half-cen­turies be­fore Guyana Harpy Ea­gles ca­pit­u­lat­ed to ex­pe­ri­enced leg-spin bowl­ing all-rounder Im­ran Khan and were bowled out against hosts T&T Red Force in the West In­dies Cham­pi­onship at the Bri­an Lara Crick­et Acad­e­my (BLCA) in Tarou­ba, San Fer­nan­do, Wednes­day.

Mean­while, Shane Dowrich de­fied a de­struc­tive spell from fel­low West In­dies Test dis­card Rah­keem Corn­wall and col­lect­ed his eighth first-class hun­dred to res­cue de­fend­ing cham­pi­on Bar­ba­dos Pride at the Queen's Park Oval in St Clair, Port-of-Spain.

And, a half-cen­tu­ry from West In­dies Test se­lectee Al­ick Athanaze and a sol­id all-round per­for­mance from Bar­ba­di­an all-rounder Justin Greaves over­shad­owed a ca­reer-best spell from Ja­maica Scor­pi­ons pac­er Der­val Green to give Wind­ward Is­lands Vol­ca­noes ear­ly com­mand of their third round match in Prov­i­dence, Guyana.

AT BLCA: Sin­clair led the way with 69, his cap­tain, John­son made 62, and wick­et­keep­er-bats­man Bram­ble cracked 56, and the Harpy Ea­gles were bowled out for 324 to claim three valu­able bat­ting points in their quest to stay ahead in the race for the George Headley & Ever­ton Weekes Tro­phy.

Red Force were sev­en with­out loss from the on­ly over of their re­ply be­fore stumps were drawn with Je­re­my Solozano not out on five and fel­low left-hand­ed open­er Kee­gan Sim­mons not out on nought.

Harpy Ea­gles slumped to 33 for three ear­ly be­fore the Sin­clair, John­son, and Bram­ble per­mu­ta­tion got them out of the hole in the face of skil­ful bowl­ing from Khan, who fin­ished with four for 80 from 19.3 overs.

John­son and Ke­mol Sa­vory added 97 for the fourth wick­et, be­fore Sin­clair an­chored a sixth wick­et stand of 79 with Bram­ble and sev­enth wick­et stand of 88 with Keemo Paul that car­ried the Harpy Ea­gles past the 300 mark.

Sa­vory got 44 and Paul made 46 – and both fell to Khan – be­fore the Harpy Ea­gles lost their last four wick­ets for 17 in the span of 44 balls.

AT THE OVAL: Dowrich, the Pride cap­tain, hit a pur­pose­ful, un­de­feat­ed 116 that led his side to 294 for eight in their first in­nings at the close on the open­ing day of their match to put them on the brink of three cru­cial bat­ting points.

The 31-year-old wick­et­keep­er-bats­man shared a cou­ple of half-cen­tu­ry stands in the sec­ond half of the day af­ter burly off-spin­ner Corn­wall threat­ened to gut the Pride bat­ting with a spell of six for 50 from 24 overs.

Corn­wall re­moved left-han­der Shayne Mose­ley for four, fel­low open­er Zachary Mc­Cask­ie for 26, and rook­ie Jonathan Drakes for 22, and Pride stum­bled to 57 for three at lunch.

Pac­er Sheeno Berridge tight­ened the screws when he got left-han­der Jonathan Carter caught in the slips for a duck with the fifth ball af­ter the in­ter­val be­fore Dowrich and West In­dies Un­der-19 grad­u­ate Kevin Wick­ham halt­ed the slide with a fifth-wick­et stand of 93.

Corn­wall got Wick­ham for 41 and for West In­dies Un­der-19 World Cup win­ner Shamar Springer for four and Pride slumped to 164 for six at tea.

Af­ter the break, Dowrich got sol­id sup­port from left-han­der Do­minic Drakes, the son of for­mer Bar­ba­dos and West In­dies pac­er turned Pride coach Vas­bert Drakes, and for­mer Hur­ri­canes off-spin­ner Chaim Hold­er.

Drakes made 22 and put on 47 for the sev­enth wick­et with Dowrich be­fore he was caught close to the wick­et, and Hold­er made a ca­reer-best 43 be­fore he fell to left-arm pac­er Col­in Archibald in the fi­nal half-hour, and the Hur­ri­canes end­ed the day with two bowl­ing points.

AT GUYANA NA­TION­AL STA­DI­UM: Athanaze wast­ed no time af­ter re­turn­ing from the West In­dies Test Tour of South Africa and hit the top score of 81 and Greaves made 50, but the Vol­ca­noes bat­ting woes con­tin­ued and they were bowled out for 217 in their first in­nings, fail­ing to get a bat­ting point.

Green un­der­mined the Vol­ca­noes bat­ting with five for 30 from 11 overs, while fel­low pac­er Nichol­son Gor­don and off-spin­ner Jamie Mer­chant sup­port­ed with two wick­ets apiece, and the Scor­pi­ons claimed full bowl­ing points.

Greaves, how­ev­er, gave firm proof that he has now over­come the in­juries that lim­it­ed his bowl­ing in the past few sea­sons when he bagged four for 34 from sev­en overs and sent the Scor­pi­ons slid­ing to 98 for sev­en at the close, putting the Vol­ca­noes in place to grab full bowl­ing points.

Green has so far made the top score of 33 not out and Mer­chant made 24 be­fore he de­part­ed in the day’s fi­nal over lbw to Greaves.

The Scor­pi­ons wob­bled to 41 for six in the first hour af­ter tea be­fore Mer­chant came to the wick­et and put on 57 with Green, but he too failed to bat out the day.

Vol­ca­noes had ear­li­er sunk to 51 for four be­fore Greaves came to the crease and shared 107 for the fifth wick­et with Athanaze on ei­ther side of lunch.

Af­ter leg-spin­ner Abi­jhai Mans­ingh got Athanaze lbw, Vol­ca­noes lost their last sev­en wick­ets for 43 in the span of 66 balls.

CMC

SUM­MARISED SCORES:

At BLCA:

GUYANA HARPY EA­GLES 324 (Kevin Sin­clair 69, Leon John­son 62, An­tho­ny Bram­ble 56, Keemo Paul 46, Ke­mol Sa­vory 44; Im­ran Khan 4-80, Bryan Charles 3-85, Uth­man Muham­mad 2-31) vs T&T RED FORCE sev­en with­out loss.

At Queen’s Park Oval:

BAR­BA­DOS PRIDE 294/8 (Shane Dowrich 116 not out, Chaim Hold­er 43, Kevin Wick­ham 41, Zachary Mc­Cask­ie 26, Jonathan Drakes 22, Do­minic Drakes 22; Rah­keem Corn­wall 6-50) vs LEE­WARD IS­LANDS HUR­RI­CANES.

At Guyana Na­tion­al Sta­di­um:

WIND­WARD IS­LANDS VOL­CA­NOES 217 (Al­ick Athanaze 81, Justin Greaves 50, Tevyn Wal­cott 22; Der­val Green 5-30, Nichol­son Gor­don 2-26, Jamie Mer­chant 2-39) vs JA­MAICA SCOR­PI­ONS 98/7 (Der­val Green 33 not out, Jamie Mer­chant 24; Justin Greaves 4-34, Sher­mon Lewis 2-29).