Barbados Royals 161/5 (Phillips 56*, Reifer 31*; Reifer 3/25, Perera 2/17) beat Jamaica Tallawahs 146/9(Brooks 47, Braithwaite 29*; Permaul 2/15, Powell 1/21) by 15 runs

Barbados Royals got their first win of the 2021 Hero Caribbean Premier League (CPL) with a comfortable 15 run victory over the Jamaica Tallawahs. 

The Royals won the toss and opted to bat first and Glenn Phillips ensured that they put a competitive total on the board with an unbeaten 56 from 46 balls.

In reply the Tallawahs chase was over before it really began as they lost four wickets in the PowerPlay and as a result never kept pace with the run rate. 

The Royals opted to make a change to their opening pair – with Shai Hope partnering Johnson Charles and it appeared to work with them putting on 32 run partnership from 20 balls.

However, once Hope was dismissed it sparked a flurry of wickets that left Barbados teetering at 48/3 at the end of PowerPlay. It should have been even worse but Haider Ali dropped Glenn Phillips when he was on 2 runs.

Phillips punished that drop in the back end of the Barbados innings hitting a half century with 56 runs from 46 balls and he was ably assisted by Raymon Reifer in a brisk partnership of 79 runs.

161 always looked like 15 runs too many and the Tallawahs got their chase off to the worst possible start losing four wickets inside the PowerPlay.

Some good bowling and electric fielding by Hayden Walsh Jr had the Tallawahs on the back foot throughout. 

Carlos Braithwaite and Shamarh Brooks threatened to bring them back into the game with a 66-run partnership but a double strike from Reifer got rid of Braithwaite and Andre Russell in the same over.

Despite some late blows from Miguel Pretorius that made the last few overs interesting there was always too much for the Tallawahs to do once Russell had departed. 

-CPL