Miserly Narine hands Warriors fifth loss
After Sunil Narine set things up with the ball, Brendon McCullum's steady half-century helped Trinbago Knight Riders seal their sixth successful chase this season
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
For a brief while after he returned from a remodelled action last year, Narine lacked bite. He was largely one-dimensional with batsmen playing him comfortably off the pitch, largely because they played him like a seamer. Even when he didn't go for runs, getting among the wickets seemed a struggle. Now, the variations are back. He gets them to swerve in and out with the new ball and cut back sharply with the old, with the odd knuckle-ball thrown in between.
Jason Mohammed's T20 strike-rate coming into this game was 98.66. On this surface, his side would've gladly taken that strike-rate, but for nothing less than 50 deliveries faced. Under pressure, though, he did just that, batting almost till the end to bring up his second T20 fifty to lead a revival of sorts. Particularly impressive was his intent of looking to force the pace in the face of some superb slow bowling, even if the execution was off, at times. His 63-run fourth-wicket stand with Gajanand Singh, who was all about deft touches and nurdles in his run-a-ball 27, lifted them past 100. The late surge never came, despite having wickets in hand. They managed just 29 off the last four overs.
Knight Riders lost two early wickets. Warriors followed their opponent's template by trying to twist them into knots with spin. It nearly worked. McCullum was all at sea against Rashid Khan, who put him through a tough examination. But his inclination to fight it out, even if it meant having to look scrappy and ungainly, helped his team.
Shashank Kishore is a senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo