Guyana Amazon Warriors have named talented West Indies batsman Nicholas Pooran as captain for the forthcoming edition of the Caribbean Premier League, starting August 28.
Pooran, the ever-exciting left-hand batter, will be replacing Chris Green at the helm. Green has been released by the Warriors despite ending the league stage positioned second and reaching the semi-finals last summer.
Apart from Pooran, Shimron Hetmyer, Brandon King, Imran Tahir, and Naveen Ul Haq also feature in the Warriors’ retention list for the CPL 2021, with the notable exclusion of Afghanistan spinner Mujeeb ur Rahman, who was his team’s top wicket-taker last season.
In the Jamaica Tallawahs‘ camp, the most interesting and surprising retention is that of the prominent all-rounder Andre Russell. It’s surprising since Russell had indicated last year that he isn’t enjoying his team with the franchise and could exit the setup at the end of the tournament. But Russell will continue with the team and do so alongside local stars Carlos Brathwaite, Rovman Powell, Chadwick Walton, Fidel Edwards and youngster Ryan Persaud.
Barbados Tridents have kept their trust on Jason Holder as captain despite finishing fifth in the six-team points table last year. Tridents lost as many as seven of their ten matches but have retained Holder as skipper and all-rounder for the coming season. Shai Hope, Kyle Mayers, Raymon Reifer, Justin Greaves, Nyeem Young, Joshua Bishop, Johnson Charles and Hayden Walsh Jr feature are among the other retentions for the Tridents, who have clinched the title twice in CPL history.
Popular franchise and defending champions, Trinbago Knight Riders, have notably traded experienced all-rounder Dwayne Bravo to St. Kitts and Nevis Patriots and have got wicketkeeper-batsman Denesh Ramdin in return. Knight Riders have rightfully retained their core group of players from last season after lifting the coveted title, with Kieron Pollard set to continue captaining his team. Pollard’s team will once again feature the likes of Lendl Simmons, Colin Munro, Sunil Narine, Darren Bravo, Sikandar Raza and Khary Pierre. Simmons topped the CPL 2020 run-charts with 356 runs to his name.
Weakened by the absence of quite a few of their first-choice picks due to hurdles amid the COVID-19 pandemic, St Kitts & Nevis Patriots finished at the bottom of the CPL 2020 points table. The Patriots won just one and lost as many as eight of their ten league matches. But they’ll feel bolstered by the entry of Dwayne Bravo in the camp and have also traded in Sherfane Rutherford from Warriors with the aim of strengthening their top 6.
St Lucia Zouks, the CPL 2020 runners-up, haven’t yet revealed the name of their new skipper after all-rounder Darren Sammy decided to quit playing for them recently. Sammy has been given a new role in the setup, appointed the T20 cricket consultant and Brand Ambassador for the franchise. The Zouks have retained Andre Fletcher, Kesrick Williams, Rahkeem Cornwall and Roston Chase in their squad for the coming season. They’ve, however, made a couple of big releases, letting go of Mohammad Nabi and Rashid Khan, the Afghanistan spin duo, due to their international commitments.
