95 for 7 and still chasing 206: how Guyana are running away with the Global Super League

Guyana Amazon Warriors were 95 for 7 in the 11th over on Saturday night, chasing 206 against the Desert Vipers. They won that game. Romario Shepherd hit 52 from 21 balls, Mohammad Nabi finished on 40 not out, and the pair put on 91 for the eighth wicket to get the Warriors home with three balls to spare.

That is the sort of thing that has been happening all week in Providence, and it is why the defending champions are top of the Global Super League with three wins from three and a place in the final almost in hand.

What the Global Super League actually is

The GSL is a five-team tournament played entirely at Providence Stadium in Guyana, and its selling point is the line-up. Each side comes from a different franchise league: Guyana Amazon Warriors from the Caribbean Premier League, Lahore Qalandars from the PSL, Desert Vipers from the ILT20, Perth Scorchers XI from the Big Bash and San Francisco Unicorns from Major League Cricket.

They play each other once, 10 matches in all, for a prize pool of US$1 million. The team that finishes first goes straight to the final on 1 August. Second and third meet in a qualifier on 31 July to decide who joins them. This is the third edition, and the Warriors are the holders, having beaten Rangpur Riders by 32 runs in last year’s final.

Three wins, and only one of them straightforward

The Warriors opened on 23 July against San Francisco, who posted 156 for 6 before rain cut the chase to 16 overs and a revised target of 131. Guyana got there at 131 for 7 with three balls left.

Then came the Vipers game on 25 July, the 206 chase and the collapse to 95 for 7 that Shepherd and Nabi rescued. Quentin Sampson and Rahmanullah Gurbaz had given them 55 for the first wicket before the middle order disappeared. Three balls to spare again.

Sunday night was the one where they looked like a team that belonged at the top. Gurbaz made 65 from 35 balls in a total of 164 for 9, which did not look like enough, and then Gudakesh Motie took it apart. The left-arm spinner finished with 4 for 15 from his four overs, bowling the Lahore captain Michael Bracewell and removing Delano Potgieter for a golden duck off the next ball. Lahore Qalandars were bowled out for 111 in 17.2 overs, a 53-run defeat and their first of the tournament.

The individual numbers say the same thing

Gurbaz leads the tournament’s run charts with 127 at an average of 42.33 from three innings. Motie has six wickets at 14.66, one behind Lahore’s Usama Mir, who has seven at 11.57. San Francisco’s Ghulam Mudassar also has six, from two innings.

Having the leading run scorer and one of the leading bowlers in the same side tends to show up in the table, and it has. The Warriors are on six points with a net run rate of 1.145. Nobody else is above 0.02.

What is still to play for

Guyana have one league match left, against Perth Scorchers XI on 29 July. Win it and they finish on eight points, which no other side can reach, and they are in the final without having to play the qualifier. Even if they lose, they cannot finish outside the top three, so the qualifier is already guaranteed at worst.

Behind them, Lahore are on four with San Francisco to come, and the Unicorns are on two with two matches left, so both can still get to six. The Big Bash’s Perth Scorchers XI and the ILT20’s Desert Vipers are yet to win a game between them. For a tournament built to put one league’s franchises up against another’s, that is its own kind of answer.

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