Stats: Guyana Amazon Warriors race into CPL 2019 final with a record winning streak

Guyana Amazon Warriors have been unstoppable in the ongoing edition of the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) where they cruised to final for the 5th time in the league’s history. In seven seasons of CPL, the Amazon Warriors got through to the final on five occasions and settled down with playoffs in other two. Despite five appearances in the final, the Guyana franchise is awaiting their maiden CPL title. They would be hoping to end their title wait at least this time.

The Shoaib Malik-led team has pulled off victories out of most critical situations in this season. One of them was against Jamaica Tallawahs in the group stage. They were four wickets down for just 8 in 1.2 overs of the game. But Malik’s unbeaten 73 pushed Warriors to 156/6 and later saw them winning the game by a huge 77-run margin. They won each of the ten league stage matches and extended their winning streak to 11 with a win over Barbados Tridents in the qualifier match on Sunday.

The opening pair of Brandon King and Chandrapaul Hemraj have been quite consistent while Nicholas Pooran and Shoaib Malik stepped up in crucial situations. From the second half of the tournament, the Amazon Warriors attacked the oppositions with the ploy of spin bowlers. The first ten overs of the innings are bowled by the spinners – Chris Green, Imran Tahir and a couple of overs from Hemraj or Malik. This strategy usually put opponents into trouble before the pacers are introduced.

In this process, Guyana Amazon Warriors became the first team to win all their league matches in any franchise league. In fact, they are only the 2nd side to win all matches in the league phase of a domestic tournament. Karnataka team was the first with the feat in the Syed Mushtaq Ali tournament this year. Currently, Guyana’s winning streak of 11 wins is the 3rd best for any franchise T20 side. The IPL team Kolkata Knight Riders won 14 in a row in 2014 which includes five wins in the CLT20 played that year.

They thus broke the record held by the Big Bash team Sydney Sixers who won 12 consecutive T20s in 2012. Their streak includes the six straight wins in the CLT20 which helped them to lift the title. Prior to Guyana, no team has even won 8 successive games in the CPL. The biggest winning streak for any team in the Twenty20 format is recorded by Sialkot Stallions, the Pakistan domestic T20 side. They won 25 successive T20 games between 2006 and 2010.

Most consecutive wins for a team in the Twenty20 format:

(Stats as on October 6, 2019)