A sublime spell of spin bowling by the Player of the Match (POTM) Roston Chase combined with a whirlwind knock by Shai Hope helped West Indies outclass the USA by nine wickets in a Super Eight clash at Kensington Oval in Bridgetown, Barbados. The win was extremely vital for West Indies as it now keeps them alive in the race to the semifinals.
Hope and Nicholas Pooran (27* off 12 balls) made light work of the USA's total (128) and chased it down with nine overs to spare. Hope showed some real intent as soon as the run chase got underway. He killed the run chase inside the powerplay as he powered the Windies to 58 for no loss, sailing at 9.66 runs per over.
Having replaced Brandon King in the playing XI, Hope looked unrelenting in terms of his approach and punished the USA bowlers. The right-handed batter struck four boundaries and smashed eight sixes during his unbeaten knock of 82. He chewed up just 39 balls in the process and batted at a strike rate of 210.25.
Hope's knock turned out to be extremely critical for the Windies as it helped them move past England on the points table in Group 2. West Indies have the best net run rate (NRR) (1.814) in Group 2, even better than South Africa's 0.625 who are at the top of the ladder with four points to their credit.
Earlier in the game, West Indies elected to field first after winning the toss with a bit of rain around and the decision was justified by Chase who dazzled with the ball and stifled USA's batting. Chase picked up the big wickets of Aaron Jones, Corey Anderson and Harmeet Singh to demolish USA's batting and prepared an ideal launchpad for his batters.
Barring Andries Gous and Nitish Kumar, none of the other USA batters looked comfortable in the middle. Gous top scored for the USA with 29 off 16 balls whereas Nitish looked impressive for his 20 off 19 deliveries. The hammering at the hands of the Windies has ended USA's campaign in the World Cup.
