The United States gave Bermuda a lesson in disciplined batting yesterday on their way to a second win over the host side in the ICC Americas Under-17 Match Play Tournament.

Delray Rawlins’s illness left a big hole to fill in the batting, and while captain Alex Dore led from the front with his impressive innings of 85 no other batsman reached double figures as Bermuda crashed to their third defeat in the tournament.

Bermuda’s weakness was clearly evident as the top order again failed to lay a good foundation, Dore lost partners in the third, sixth, seventh, ninth and tenth overs as the US had them in deep trouble at 35 for five in just 47 minutes after the US put them into bat first for the first time in the tournament after winning the toss.

Dore tried desperately to post a total for his bowlers to defend, facing 148 balls and hitting 12 fours and two sixes before he was last out in the 47th over, bowled by left-arm spinner Jash Patel.

There was only token support for Dore at the other end as Shaquille Outerbridge, Nzari Paynter, Freeman Lema and Isiah Richardson all went for ducks while Jordan Smith made one. A stand of 25 for the sixth wicket with wicketkeeper Amari Ebbin offered some hope, though Dore was still doing the bulk of the scoring.

“It’s a process but a lot of positives have come out of it even though we have played three and lost three,” Clevie Wade, the Bermuda coach, said.

“In certain areas we are falling down and need to work on. I’m going to be honest, it’s our batting where our top order is not coming to the party and we get one out of the top five [making runs] which is not good enough at this level.

“We have addressed that to them, we’ve had training sessions where we have tried to get the top order to build partnerships which is key, but unfortunately the first two games it was just Delray and today it was Alex. We needed another two from the top order to come to the party.”

Wade was pleased to see Dore have a good knock after a string of low scores recently. “It’s good to see him get some runs under his belt,” Wade said.

“I told him from the beginning, ‘You are a senior player in this team. You have to take the responsibility and bat long’.

“The first two days he didn’t come good but today was his day. He put his head down and batted and batted until he was last man out. He showed the talent is there. It is just about the mindset, being disciplined and staying focused.”

San’j Dill, who joined Dore at Ebbin’s departure, was hit in the chin by a rising delivery while batting and went to hospital as precaution before returning to bat after the fall of the ninth wicket.

He finished six not out while Christion Gibbons was second high man with eight after sharing in an eighth wicket stand of 46 with Dore between the 26th and 38th overs. There were 42 extras, including 26 wides.

Keifer Phill, the US captain who took the new ball, and first-change Jash Patel both took three wickets to rip the heart out of the Bermuda batting.

Phill finished with three for 22 from eight overs while Patel’s slow deliveries left the Bermuda batsmen in a spin as he finished with figures of three for seven from 6.5 overs with two maidens.

Nahusha Rao took one for 17 from eight overs and Gauranshu Sharma one for 22 off eight as Dore continued to lose partners in the nineteenth, 26th and 38th overs before a ninth-wicket stand of 24 with Micah Simons pushed them towards the 150 mark. Patel ended the innings by taking two wickets in five balls in his seventh over.

Bermuda toiled with the ball in trying to defend their modest total. By the time they got the breakthrough with Gibbons, the seventh bowler used, removing Sagar Patel for a 54-ball knock of 12, the US were well on their way to victory after an opening stand of 67 in 21 overs.

Gauranshu Sharma led the run chase with 61 not out in 122 balls with three fours while Kusai Ganji hit eight fours in his knock of 44, facing 61 balls in the stand which produced 84 runs.

The US will meet Canada again today before the weeklong tournament concludes on Saturday with Bermuda playing Canada and hoping for a consolation win.

“We will go back to the drawing board and prepare for Saturday, hoping to end on a winning note,” Wade said.