St Lucia, Sep 12 (IANS): Saint Lucia Kings kept their Hero CPL hopes alive with dominant win over St Kitts & Nevis Patriots.

The Patriots opted to field first after winning the toss. That decision seemed to have backfired as Johnson Charles and Faf Du Plessis put on a blistering opening partnership that saw them post 61 runs in the PowerPlay.

They put on 86 for the first wicket, before Charles was dismissed in the ninth over. His 41 included four fours and two sixes. The Lucia Kings faltered after losing nine wickets for 75 runs and totalled 161 for nine, which was a challenging total. Some late hitting from Matthew Forde ensured the Kings were able to post a par score of 161.

However, the Patriots got off to a bad start in the PowerPlay losing three wickets for 48 runs. They never recovered from that position.

The Lucia Kings blew them away with an excellent performance in the field and leading the way was Tim David with a CPL record equalling five catches in the outfield.

The Patriots were in deep trouble very early on. Forde ripped through the top three to leave the Patriots in a mess. From that point the Patriots failed to build any meaningful partnership as their top order continued to struggle.

When Alzarri Joseph removed Darren Bravo for 20 to leave the Patriots on 81 for six, the end was near and the Patriots were bowled out for 100.

Brief scores: St Lucia 161/9 in 20 overs (Johnson Charles 40, Faf du Plessis 61, Dwaine Pretorius 3/37, Rashid Khan 2/12, Sheldon Cottrell 2/41) beat St Kitts and Nevis Patriots 100 all out in 19 overs (Evin Lewis 24, Darren Bravo 20, Matthew Forde 3/19, David Wiese 3/17) by 61 runs.