Zimbabwe might have ruffled a few feathers in this World Cup with victories over Australia and Sri Lanka.
But the Chevrons well and truly had their wings clipped by Hetmyer and company as the boundaries were peppered at the Wankhede Stadium.
Hetmyer had looked in fine fettle in the group stage, chalking up scores of 64, 23, 46 not out and one.
The 29-year-old took it up a notch and played more astutely than perhaps the raw figures of the scorecard might indicate.
With a cocktail of intelligent farming of the strike, elegant drives and at times sheer brute force, he reached a half-century off 19 balls, which left Zimbabwe flummoxed.
It was the quickest by a West Indian at a World Cup – eclipsing his own record off 22 balls against Scotland earlier in the tournament.
Nobody has more than sixes than Hetmyer’s 17 in this tournament, and while there was power in the strokeplay in this innings, it was more about sharp decisions over shot selection with the mind than pure muscle.
“I’m not overthinking my batting. Now I am trying to think less and the bat will now do the talking and I react [to] what’s in front of me,” Hetmyer said afterwards.
Zimbabwe rued dropping him twice, with the hapless Musekiwa wishing the Wankhede turf would swallow him up after he spilled two opportunities his team-mates would have expected him to take.
It might have been different had the first been held, although with strike rates of 238 (Rutherford), 210 (Shepherd) and 325 (Holder), possibly not.
Zimbabwe were never in the chase after Motie and Hosein turned the screw – West Indies’ left-arm tweakers bagging seven of the wickets to fall.
The West Indies World Cup bandwagon rolls on after banking another impressive victory and the only concern is whether they are peaking too early.
Certainly on this evidence they will take some stopping.
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