Samuels, Sammy do the Houdini act

Marlon Samuels, Sri Lanka v West Indies
78 off 56 balls

Chris Gayle's missile, "Sorry Sri Lanka, it's West Indies all the way", fired before the final against Sri Lanka seemed to have boomeranged when West Indies chose to bat and dug a hole for themselves. They needed someone to save the day against a Sri Lankan team desperate to win the title in front of their home fans. It wasn't going to be Gayle this time; West Indies' fight came through the bat of Marlon Samuels.

Samuels walked in the din that followed the fall of Johnson Charles in the first over and left the first ball alone as West Indies made a nervous start. Gayle looked his usual self as he played out the next over, a touch unconvincingly followed by another tight over, where Samuels struggled to find an attacking shot. Three overs, 2 for 1 was a score that the West Indies camp wouldn't have worried about, but when that changed to six overs, 14 for 2, with Gayle back, the team's promised show was fast turning to a dud for the neutral fan.

But Samuels had a plan as he ran hard and kept the scoreboard ticking, albeit at a slow pace. Things changed in the 13th over when Lasith Malinga was introduced.

Unlike most batsmen, who plan to target the weakest link, Samuels went after the strongest. A near yorker was thwacked over the mid-wicket fence; the next one went over covers for another six. Two balls later, another missed yorker was sent over long on. Twenty-one runs came off that over and woke up everyone from the slumber. Two overs later, Samuels meted out similar treatment to spinner Jeevan Mendis, hitting him for a six and a four. From 26 off 37 balls, Samuels had raced to 54 off 46 balls. West Indies, however, were nowhere near safety. Back came Malinga in the 17th over, and Samuels greeted him with a six of a short ball and a 108-meter monster hit down the ground to take West Indies past 100.

By the time Samuels was out, he had single-handedly pulled the team out from a dark corner. But more than the patience he showed, his innings was about those five sixes off Malinga , an attack on Sri Lanka's top bowler, that left a scar so deep that it led to Sri Lanka's fall later.

Darren Sammy, Sri Lanka v West Indies
26* off 15 balls, 2 for 6

West Indies' innings had been given some respectability after Samuel's assault on Malinga, but captain Sammy made sure that the three overs after Samuel was out were taken advantage of as he lifted the team from 108 for 6 to 137. Sammy's 15-ball 26 included taking 15 runs off the last over, bowled by another one of Sri Lanka's economical bowlers, Nuwan Kulasekara. If there was a parallel between West Indies' batting and football, Samuels' innings was equivalent to a player running with the ball from his half to Sri Lanka's before passing the ball to Sammy inside the box. Sammy, on his part, scored the goal.

The total was not a match-winning one, by any stretch of imagination. The task of coaxing a fight from his team was on Sammy. He rotated his strike bowlers in the first ten overs in which Sri Lanka had moved to 51 for 2. With wickets in hand, Sri Lanka were still favourites. Sammy, the supposed weak link in the line up, brought himself on in the 11th over and after bowling three dots balls, he foxed Mathews with a slower ball. Mathews had gone down on his knees to play the scoop shot over the short fine-leg fielder, but the ball was so slow that Mathews was almost off balance. He missed the ball and saw his stumps splayed. The wicket opened the floodgates as Sri Lanka started to panic.

Sammy got another one in his second over when Lahiru Thirimanne mistimed a slog to wide long-on. A little while later, he was leading a dance troupe around the ground along with Gayle. For a player whose place in the squad has been questioned, Sammy delivered when it mattered.