The small is­lands in the Caribbean are al­ways on the look­out for hur­ri­canes around this time of the year and the St Kitts Nevis Pa­tri­ots will be aware that one is head­ed their way in the form of the Trin­ba­go Knight Rid­ers.

There will be no threat to life and limb but there may be one to the in­fra­struc­ture at the age­ing Warn­er Park, where they will bat­tle with the Pa­tri­ots in their fifth match of the 2019 Hero Caribbean Pre­mier League on Tues­day night.

The glass win­dows at the venue will be un­der se­ri­ous threat and the fans might even con­sid­er wear­ing hel­mets in the stands be­cause the balls are ex­pect­ed to blow fierce­ly in their di­rec­tion. If Fri­day night is any­thing to judge from, the TKR bats­men will be bru­tal when they make land­fall.

Ja­maica felt the wrath of the TKR bats­men’s pow­er as they scored the high­est ever to­tal in the his­to­ry of T20 fran­chise crick­et, 267-2, at Sabi­na Park. Ja­maica tried to make a fight of it but end­ed on 226-5 in their 20 overs.

New Zealan­der Col­in Munro flew in from the East where he was play­ing for his na­tion­al team and ham­mered the Tallawahs bowl­ing in com­pil­ing 96 not out in the TKR’s record to­tal.

Pri­or to him, how­ev­er, the warn­ing of the TKR’s in­tent was sig­nalled by Lendl Sim­mons, who ripped apart the bowl­ing with the aid of open­ing part­ner Sunil Nar­ine. The two had the Ja­maican fans duck­ing and run­ning as they put on 55 from five overs. Nar­ine left for 20 and Sim­mons then joined forces with Munro and that was that.

Sim­mons smashed 86 and Kieron Pol­lard 45 not out as fours and six­es flew all around the ground and the Tallawahs paid a heavy price for an er­ror-strewn dis­play full of dropped catch­es and no balls.

The Tallawahs tried to boss the run chase. The big-hit­ting pair of Chris Gayle and Glenn Phillips ex­plod­ed from the blocks. There was no oth­er way for the Tallawahs to go. But their progress was checked in the eighth over by a dou­ble strike from Mo­ham­mad Has­nain, who bowled Gayle for 39 from 24 balls and then had Chad­wick Wal­ton caught be­hind from a top-edged pull.

Things got tougher when Rov­man Pow­ell had to re­tire hurt with what ap­peared to be an ab­dom­i­nal in­jury af­ter smash­ing his sec­ond ball over mid­wick­et for six. He had been in dis­com­fort while bowl­ing in the first in­nings and didn’t re­turn to the mid­dle. With An­dre Rus­sell al­so side­lined af­ter be­ing hit on the head against the St Lu­cia Zouks the night be­fore, the sight of Pow­ell in such ob­vi­ous pain will be a wor­ry for the Tallawahs with three more home games to come over the next week.

Phillips went through to his 50 from just 22 balls, hav­ing been dropped twice when on 37, but his luck ran out on 62 as he mis­cued Pol­lard to deep mid­wick­et where Munro made no mis­take.

Ear­li­er, no-balls and dropped catch­es cost the Tallawahs dear­ly, with the tone set in the Pow­er­play when Sim­mons was caught at mid-on off a no-ball. The Knight Rid­ers racked up 65-1 in those six overs and on­ly ac­cel­er­at­ed from there.

Sim­mons was al­so dropped in the deep twice in the 10th over as the Tallawahs out-crick­et was ragged. He end­ed up falling in the most far­ci­cal man­ner. He was caught in the deep off a free hit af­ter yet an­oth­er no-ball, Der­val Green cel­e­brat­ing the catch be­fore re­al­is­ing it was a free hit and ar­row­ing a throw in­to the bowler’s end to run Sim­mons out as he at­tempt­ed a third run. He made 86 from 42 in all, with eight fours and five six­es.

But Munro was still here and he con­tin­ued to plun­der the bowl­ing by strik­ing Green for back-to-back six­es as a hun­dred start­ed to look a re­al pos­si­bil­i­ty. But it was Tay­lor’s fi­nal over – the 18th of the in­nings – that en­sured the record books would be rewrit­ten again.

Munro’s 96 came off 50 balls with eight six­es and six fours.