While Excelsior High Cricket Coach Kirkland Bailey was pleased to get one over powerful rural opposition in the ISSA Super 8 Twenty20 (T20) final, Barry Barnes, the coach of fellow finalists Manchester High, says the standard of play was indicative of all-island progress at the youth level.

Excelsior defeated Manchester High by 32 runs in the high-scoring contest at Sir P Oval in Clarendon on May 31 to secure their third Under-19 title of the season.

Scores: Excelsior 245-2 (20 ovs); Manchester 213 (19.2 ovs)

They had already won the 2025 Grace Shield and First Global Bank T20 competitions, both contested among urban area teams.

Bailey acknowledged that his team was below par in the rain-truncated, drawn, three-day Spalding Cup match in April — when St Elizabeth Technical High School (STETHS) prevailed courtesy of first-innings honours — but delivered a high-quality performance against Manchester in the T20 showpiece.

“The way we showed up and played against our rural counterparts in the all-island final was somewhat of a redemption based on the fact that we thought we let ourselves down in the Spalding Cup… [with] our first-innings performance,” he told the Jamaica Observer.

“We wanted to get a formidable total, one that they would have to do something special to get, and the batsmen did that. The bowlers came in and dug in when we were under some pressure in the first 10 overs and pulled it back,” Bailey added.

Barnes said the final was a good advertisement for schoolboy cricket.

“Hats off to Excelsior and to Manchester as well… [I am] very disappointed but that’s how the game is — somebody has to win and somebody has to lose,” the Manchester High coach told the Observer.

“If you see a final with over 400 runs scored, it means that something is happening in cricket at the schoolboy level. Along with STETHS, these were two of the better schoolboy teams prepared this year,” Barnes noted.

Left-hander David Dewar was the star of Excelsior’s batting, smashing a 65-ball 138 not out which included 12 fours and 10 sixes.

Dewar’s opening partner Jamare Daley made 44 from 36 deliveries as the pair added 149 for the first wicket. Justin Adlam slammed a 17-ball, unbeaten 53 featuring seven sixes and a four as Excelsior blasted 94 runs from the last five overs and one ball. Roshawn McKenzie took 2-41 for Manchester.

Manchester, the rural T20 champions, put up a valiant chase, rocketing to 148-3 in the 12th over before Excelsior stemmed the tide and pulled off a relatively comfortable win.

Pajay Nelson led Manchester with 89 from 39 balls, highlighted by 10 fours and half a dozen sixes. Jovaine Williams, Tarique Forbes, Demarco Scott, and Geovanni Grey all took two wickets for Excelsior.

“I’m glad to have ticked this one off because it’s our first hold on the all-island T20 crown,” said Bailey.

“Our team work was excellent throughout the season, and we made it to all four finals that we could have. We won three out of the four, which is a commendable performance by the boys.”

The other schools which competed in the Super 8 T20 competition this season were STETHS and Clarendon College, Tacky High, St Jago High, Kingston College, and Jamaica College.

Manchester had defeated STETHS in one semi-final, while Excelsior had beaten Clarendon College in the other.

— Sanjay Myers