ST JOHN’S, An­tigua — Trinidad and To­ba­go Red Force will be seek­ing to cap­ture their first West In­dies Cham­pi­onship ti­tle in two decades when they bat­tle three-time de­fend­ing cham­pi­ons Guyana Harpy Ea­gles in the fi­nal at the Sir Vi­vian Richard Sta­di­um on Sun­day.

The two teams booked their paths to the fi­nal in con­trast­ing fash­ions, with the Harpy Ea­gles au­to­mat­i­cal­ly qual­i­fy­ing for the fi­nal af­ter top­ping the ta­ble at the end of the pre­lim­i­nary rounds, while T&T were made to dig deep be­fore de­feat­ing arch-ri­vals Bar­ba­dos Pride in their play­off game.

T&T will fan­cy their chances of up­set­ting the un­beat­en Harpy Ea­gles, hav­ing been sol­id with both bat and ball so far in the com­pe­ti­tion.

Fit­ting­ly, their bat­ting has been led by the tour­na­ment’s lead­ing run scor­er, cap­tain Joshua Da Sil­va, who has scored 402 runs in five in­nings at an av­er­age of 80.40, in­clud­ing a dou­ble cen­tu­ry and two half-cen­turies.

He has been well sup­port­ed by Amir Jan­goo, who has scored 359 runs, and open­er Cephas Coop­er (229 runs), high­light­ed by a cen­tu­ry and a half cen­tu­ry against the Pride.

All-rounder Ter­rance Hinds has al­so com­ple­ment­ed the top or­der, con­tribut­ing 222 runs along with nine wick­ets so far in the tour­na­ment.

Mean­while with the ball, An­der­son Phillip has been the tour­na­ment’s lead­ing wick­et-tak­ing pac­er with 21 wick­ets, while Jay­den Seales has claimed 16 wick­ets in just three match­es.

The depth and ver­sa­til­i­ty of the bowl­ing at­tack, com­bined with the strong bat­ting form, are key rea­sons why Da Sil­va is con­fi­dent about turn­ing the ta­bles and end­ing the Red Force’s 20-year wait for the ti­tle.

“There’s a rea­son Guyana have done so well in the red ball for­mat over the last few years. We know that we might be go­ing in as the un­der­dogs, but that’s good for us.

“We know the strength that we have. We know the cal­i­bre of play­ers that we have and with Andy, Jay­den, Bryan, Khary, I think the bowl­ing at­tack is one force that is re­al­ly the strength. We’re just go­ing in­to it with every­thing that we can, leav­ing it all out on the field, and may the bet­ter team win over the four days,” DaSil­va said.

The Harpy Ea­gles will be bol­stered by the re­turn of West In­dies pac­er Shamar Joseph, who was rest­ed for their warmup match against the West In­dies Acad­e­my.

They boast of the lead­ing wick­et-tak­er in the com­pe­ti­tion in Gu­dakesh Motie, who has 26 wick­ets, while fel­low spin­ner Veerasam­my Per­maul has sup­port­ed with 13 wick­ets.

They have al­so been im­pres­sive with the bat, with open­ers Tage­nar­ine Chan­der­paul, who has scored 367 runs and Matthew Nan­du (353 runs), be­ing their linch­pins.

Cap­tain Tevin Im­lach, who is aim­ing for his third ti­tle as skip­per, said his team is con­fi­dent of fin­ish­ing the sea­son un­beat­en with an­oth­er vic­to­ry in the fi­nal.

“The guys are ea­ger and ready; the feel­ing is like last year where the ti­tle was de­cid­ed with the last game against Trinidad.

“How­ev­er, it should be a good game, and we are fi­nal­iz­ing our prepa­ra­tion de­spite some rain around, but the play­ers are in good spir­its and ready for that game,” Im­lach said. (CMC)