Nicholas Pooran calls himself a child of franchise cricket. And rightly so. Pick a random T20 tournament during whichever time of the year you want, the odds are very high that you will find the West Indian hitter not only playing there but absolutely nailing it. Nailing it is what has become second nature to him. In the past couple of years, he seems to have cracked the code for T20 cricket. How else do you hit more than 100-meter-long sixes? How else do you take on the opposition as if it’s a video game? So far this year, he is the highest run-scorer in T20 cricket with 1693 runs at a strike rate just a little shy of 160.
But it’s not only franchise cricket where he thrives. Tarouba saw him taking down the South African bowlers for fun in the first T20I tonight. The target was not too big to need the sort of innings he played but that beast inside him gets unleashed at the mere mention of T20 cricket. Pooran, striking at an unbelievable 250, went on to score an unbeaten 65 runs off 26 balls. He cleared the fence for the maximum seven times during his innings which is one more than South Africa’s collective sixes tally. Four of these came in the 12th over off Nandre Burger’s consecutive deliveries, which played havoc with his figures.
One of his sixes was a gigantic 100-meter six that had every semblance of the 113-meter biggie he smacked at the Hundred just a week ago. Besides that his maximums crossed the 90-meter mark twice during the 12th over, forcing the crowd to duck for cover. Just a normal day at the office for the West Indian wicket-keeper batter, if you ask us.
Taking nothing away from Pooran’s brilliance tonight, Brian Lara Cricket Stadium was not necessarily hard to bat on. Earlier, Tristan Stubbs scored 76 runs off 42 balls to put an end to the rot as the Proteas’ top order suffered a horrible collapse. Although he did help his team put up a respectable figure before he perished on the last ball of the innings, Tarouba, and the T20 format are the stuff of dreams for Nicky P and his peers. And boy did they try to hide that?
Shai Hope, although, could not stay to seal the affair with his teammate, his 51 runs knock off 36 balls was what set the stage for Pooran to start firing ruthlessly.
As much as it was unfathomable to see the batters showing their incredible forte, the West Indian bowlers too were unparalleled during the game. Matthew Forde, playing just his second international T20 game, sent three South African batters back to the pavilion, including the visitors’ skipper, Aiden Markaram.
West Indies are one up in the three-match series with this seven-wicket win against the visitors, South Africa. The next game will again be played at the same venue on Monday, with West Indies trying to bag the series, and from the looks of it, it does not look too difficult.
