The second game of the 2016 Caribbean Premier League season sees the St Kitts and Nevis Patriots taking on the Guyana Amazon Warriors with both sides looking to get their campaigns underway with a win. The Warriors have enjoyed the better of things in this tournament historically but hopes are high for the Patriots.
St Kitts and Nevis Patriots
After a really poor debut season things had to change for the Patriots and plenty has. Marlon Samuels wasn’t kept on and has been replaced as captain by Faf du Plessis and some real quality has been signed both from the Caribbean and overseas.
Krishmar Santokie is the biggest signing they have made. He has shown his quality in this tournament in the past. Samuel Badree is another positive signing for a side who look to have excellent balance with the bat and the ball. All eyes will be on the former baseball player Kieran Powell to see how he has dealt with the transition back into cricket.
Guyana Amazon Warriors
Things have changed for the Warriors too. Martin Guptill has surprisingly taken over as the captain and Sunil Narine has left them as have both of last season’s leading runscorers Brad Hodge and Lendl Simmons. Indeed they are both with the opposition here and should know the Warriors players very well.
Guyana don’t appear to lack in batting depth but it will be interesting to see how they line up here because they seem to have an awful lot of batsmen who prefer to open the innings in the likes Dwayne Smith, Assad Fudadin and Martin Guptill.
Team News
Neither side have reported any injuries going into the match so it looks like both will be at full strength. A number of players in the match played in the recent tri-nations so we should be getting a good quality game of cricket here.
Head to Head
Guyana won both matches last season which is probably no surprise given how poor St Kitts and Nevis were but with the changes in the squads I’m not sure how much we can look into that as a genuine form guide.
Warner Park
We saw in the recent tri-nations how small this ground is and how good the wicket is for batting so we should expect a fairly high scoring match although we also saw by the end of the stint on this ground that the wicket was beginning to take some turn so I wouldn’t think the bowlers are going to turn up petrified. We should be in for some fireworks given the batting power on show though.
Betting
This match is almost Guyana of this season against Guyana of last season with a few players who were with the Amazon Warriors now in this Patriots side and that could be invaluable for the home side.
I’ve already taken St Kitts and Nevis Patriots outright but I’m happy to get on them here at 4/5 as I see plenty of progression in them compared to the Guyana side who look like a franchise on the decline. I always go for the side with the better bowling attack in T20 matches and to be that is very much the Patriots and even at 4/5 there is enough value in them to merit a punt on the home side here.
Tips
Back St Kitts and Nevis Patriots to beat Guyana Amazon Warriors for a 4/10 stake at 1.80 with Titanbet
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