Blackwood reaping rewards of hard work

Jamaica Scorpions middle-order batsman Jermaine Blackwood is on cloud nine following his latest achievements with the bat in the West Indies Championship.

After eight rounds of matches, Blackwood has scored the most runs in the tournament with 768 runs in 15 innings with a top score 248 runs in his last innings against the Leeward Islands Hurricanes.

The right-hander is one of only two batsmen in the championship to average more than 50 runs with Barbados' Kyle Mayers being the other with 654 runs at an average of 50.30 compared to Blackwood's 51.20.

Hard work paying off

With a century and six half-centuries under his belt, Blackwood feels all the hard work is finally paying off.

"I feel very good for my achievements this season because I have put in a lot of hard work with increased practise and net sessions and my work ethic has also improved," said Blackwood.

Blackwood said he has also been doing extra training with his longtime friend West indies player Andre Russell at his residence.

"Andre and I have been training together outside of our regular training sessions and the extra work has allowed me to get fitter which has helped me to concentrate more," said Blackwood.

The 28-year-old, who has also hit the most fours in the tournament with 91, says he has got a lot of help with his batting from new coach Andre Coley.

"Coach Coley has helped me a lot because when I use to start my innings, I use to hit the ball in the air a lot. Coach Coley told me to try and score my runs on the ground for at least the first hour or two hours and since I have made the adjustment I started to spend more time at the crease and the runs started to accumulate," added Blackwood.