Jamaica wins Busta International Shield final

Jamaica have won the inaugural Busta International Shield Final after their four-day match against Guyana at Sabina Park, Kingston, ended in a draw today.

Jamaica were declared the winners by virtue of claiming a first innings lead. Guyana were dismissed for 290 on Tuesday morning after Jamaica completed their first innings on Saturday with a total of 375. Ninth-wicket pair Neil McGarrell (52) and Colin Stuart (33) extended the Guyanese innings for more than an hour into this morning's session.

With an outright result for either side now out of the question, the remainder of Monday's play revolved around academic matters, such as whether Chris Gayle could get the 106 needed to give him 1000 runs for the season, or whether Jimmy Adams would avoid a king pair. The answers, respectively, were no and yes.

Gayle reached his half-century from 80 deliveries including eight boundaries, but only added one more run to his total before hitting a Mahendra Nagamootoo googly straight to Seonarine Chattergoon at deep mid-off. Leon Garrick (11) and Marlon Samuels (21) both failed for the second time in the match, but the Jamaican captain Adams did avoid the humiliation of a second duck of the final. He remained unbeaten on 28 when play was called off after two overs of the final hour. Keith Hibbert (44) was the other major contributor to the Jamaican second innings. With his dismissal, at the hands of part-time bowler Shivnarine Chanderpaul, the match was called off, Jamaica's score being 161 for 4.

Chris Gayle was named man of the match, while Jamaican captain Jimmy Adams claimed the Busta International Shield on behalf of his team, which received $US10,000 as first prize.