A fine knock of 71 from Man-of-the-Match Evin Lewis propelled West Indies to an eight-wicket win against South Africa with 30 balls to spare and a 1-0 lead in their five-match CG Insurance T20 series.

Playing on a good batting strip at the Grenada National Stadium, Lewis hit seven sixes and four fours from 35 balls and featured in an opening stand of 86 from just seven overs with Andre Fletcher, who scored 30 before he was run out first ball of the eighth over.

Lewis and Chris Gayle put on 39 for the second wicket before the former was eventually out with the score on 124 in the 12th over. Going for an eighth six, the hard-hitting opener only managed to slice a Tabraiz Shamsi delivery off the bottom of his bat to long-off where David Miller took a good catch.

“I was backing my ability,” Lewis said afterwards, revealing that he was thinking about scoring his third T20 international century.

“It was an excellent wicket for batting, and most important is to cash in. Once I see balls in my area, I try and hit. We felt they were 30-40 runs short,”. [A century] crossed my mind, but if I score 70 and the team wins, I’m happy! Pretty good start for us.”

Chris Gayle and Andre Russell scored the remaining runs in quick fashion. Gayle, who was the more subdued, scoring his unbeaten 32 from 24 balls. He hit one four and three sixes and was more content to let Andre Russell to plunder 23 from 2 balls from which he hit a four and three sixes.

The last of those sixes came from the bowling of Lungi Ngidi, whom he hit over midwicket to win the match.

Shamzi was the most successful of the South African bowlers with 1-27 from his four overs. However, his teammates suffered at the hands of the West Indies power hitters.

Kagiso Rabada went for 32 from his three overs while Ngidi gave up 46 from three. George Linde had figures of 0-24 from the two overs he bowled.

Captain Kieron Pollard was hopeful that Lewis’ form will hold for the series.

“He is a talented cricketer and we hope that consistency can continue,” he said while adding that it was important for the West Indies to get off to a good start to the series.

“We spoke about trying to hit the first punch. Credit to our bowlers how they came back in the middle stages. 160 was un-par, and when we play one-day games here, the totals are pretty high.”

South Africa got off to a flyer scoring 33 from the first 22 balls before Fabien Allen dismissed the dangerous Reeza Hendricks for 17. Quinton de Kock looked dangerous scoring 37 from 24 balls before he got out in the seventh over as South Africa reached 61-2.

The West Indies bowlers kept things tight in the middle overs containing the South African batsmen despite the best efforts of Rassie van der Dussen, who carried his form from the Test matches to the shorter form, with an unbeaten 56.

He hit four fours and two sixes from the 38 balls he faced but he had little help as only Captain Temba Bavuna, who scored 22, managed to get into double figures as the bowlers tightened the screws.

Dwayne Bravo took 2-30 and Allen 2-18 and both were instrumental in restricting South Africa 160-6 from their 20 overs.

The dejected losing captain said his team failed to take advantage of the conditions.

“Obviously disappointed. As a team, we need to have hard discussions and come up with a better plan. We thought 160 was a decent score – probably below par – and like I said, we need to have those conversations,” said Bavuma, who said South African were several runs short of their intended target.

“In the last 10 overs, we didn’t capitalize as well as we should have.”

He credited the West Indies openers for their approach to the chase.

“They obviously played quite well. Lewis and Fletcher got them off to a flyer, and they never gave us a chance after that,” he said. “We need to be a bit more sound mentally, and come tomorrow with a better attitude.”

The second match will be played at the same venue Sunday.

Match time is 1 pm, 2 pm (ECT).