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Perera, Lahiru flatten Namibia for 56 to make it two out of two for Sri Lanka
A collective effort by Sri Lanka’s bowlers flattened Namibia for 56 in a chase of 134 in Kimberley. Left-arm spinner Vishwa Lahiru and medium-pacer Ruvishan Perera took three each as all of Namibia’s top eight batters fell for single-digit scores.
After being put in, Sri Lanka got off to a slow start, losing Pulindu Perera for 3 in the seventh over. Fast bowler Zachen Van Vuren then caused a slide, taking the next four wickets to fall, and reducing Sri Lanka to 71 for 5 within the 20th over. But Sri Lanka’s No. 3 Supun Waduge then led the resistance, scoring an unbeaten 56 off 79, although he did not get much support at the other end. Johannes de Villiers took three lower-order wickets as Sri Lanka crumbled to 133 all out.
In return, Namibia’s chase never took off. They could barely make any progress as the Sri Lanka bowlers not only struck regularly but also kept them from scoring runs. Namibia lost eight wickets for 25 runs within the 20th over. A rebuild was attempted by Peter-Daniel Blignaut and Hanro Badenhorst, who put up an 18-run partnership, but Perera ended that in the 26th over. Lahiru took the last wicket, as Namibia’s innings came to an end in 27 overs.
Brief scores:
Sri Lanka Under 19s 133 in 37.5 overs (Supun Waduge 56*; Zanchen van Vuuren 4-23, Johannes de Villiers 3-19) beat Namibia Under 19s 56 in 27 overs (Daniel Blignaut 18*; Dinura Kalupahana 2-08, Ruvishan Perera 3-03, Vishwa Lahiru 3-19) by 77 runs
A four-wicket haul from Isai Thorne, followed by an unbeaten fifty from Jewel Andrew, powered West Indies to their first win of the tournament, against Scotland in Potchefstroom.
Batting first, Scotland began steadily, as the openers Jamie Dunk (57) and Adi Hegde (32) put up an 89-run stand. However, once Hegde fell in the 22nd over, Scotland struggled to put together meaningful partnerships, as Thorne rattled the team’s top and middle order on the way to finishing with 4 for 46. Alec Price at No.3 chipped in with 31, but only two other remaining batters managed double-digit scores, as Scotland were restricted to 205 for 9.
West Indies lost wickets at regular intervals during the chase, but handy contributions from the captain Stephan Pascal (26), Jordan Johnson (24) and Mavendra Dindyal (29) kept them on track to overhauling the target. They were precariously placed at 111 for 5, but Andrew and Nathan Edward took the team home with an unbroken partnership of 95 runs. Andrew remained unbeaten on 64 off 60 balls, stroking eight fours, and was named Player of the Match.
Brief scores:
West Indies Under 19s 206 for 5 in 35.1 overs (Jewel Andrew 64*, Stephan Pacal 26, Jordon Johnson 24, Mavendra Dindyal 29, Nathan Edward 27*; Adi Hegde 1-21 ) beat Scotland Under 19s 205 for 9 in 50 overs (Jamie Dunk 57, Adi Hegde 32, Alec Price 31; Isai Thorne 4-46), Nathn Sealy 2-38) by five wickets
Pakistan maintained their perfect start to the Under-19 World Cup, as Azan Awais’ unbeaten 63 powered the team to a five-wicket win against Nepal.
Chasing a paltry 198, Pakistan were given an ideal start courtesy their openers Shamyl Hussain (37) and Shahzaib Khan (37), who added 80 in 21.2 overs. A string of quick wickets from Aakash Chand, including two in the same over, had Pakistan in a spot of bother at 104 for 4, but Awais, coming in at No.4, put together crucial partnerships with Ahmad Hassan and Haroon Arshad to take the team over the line inside 48 overs. Awais struck six fours during his 82-ball knock.
Earlier, Nepal, opting to bat, had huffed and puffed their way to 197. Bipin Rawal was the team’s top scorer with 39, but he had little by way of support, as the team lost ground at regular intervals. Six different Pakistan bowlers were in amongst the wickets, and Arafat Minhas was the pick of the lot, ending with 3 for 23, while Umaid Shah and Hassan claimed two each.
Fatima Sana will lead Pakistan at a T20 World Cup for the second consecutive edition after the PCB announced the squads for their upcoming T20I tri-series in Ireland, as well as the World Cup.
The squad features a blend of continuity and fresh inclusions, with 34-year-old batter Iram Javeed retaining her place despite a difficult recent run. Eyman Fatima, Natalia Pervaiz, Rameen Shamim, Saira Jabeen and Tasmia Rubab will travel to their maiden T20 World Cup.
Pakistan will look to overturn a run of indifferent performances at recent ICC events. At the last T20 World Cup in 2024, they exited in the group stage with one win in four games, while in 2022, they finished bottom of the pile with six defeats in seven. At last year’s ODI World Cup, Pakistan propped up the table again and were the only team in the tournament to end winless, though three of their games were washed out.
Pakistan will first travel to Ireland, where they play a tri-series that also includes West Indies from May 28 to June 4 in Dublin. Their first game at the World Cup is on June 14, against India in Birmingham. They play South Africa, the finalists from the 2024 edition, next, followed by Bangladesh, Australia and Netherlands. They will also take part in two warm-up fixtures against Sri Lanka and Scotland.
Pakistan’s most recent T20I series was a dominating 3-0 win over Zimbabwe at home, which included Sana scoring the fastest half-century in women’s T20I cricket, taking just 15 balls.
Pakistan squad for Ireland tri-series and T20 World Cup
Fatima Sana (capt), Aliya Riaz, Ayesha Zafar, Diana Baig, Eyman Fatima, Gull Feroza, Iram Javed, Muneeba Ali (wk), Nashra Sundhu, Natalia Pervaiz, Rameen Shamim, Sadia Iqbal, Saira Jabeen, Tasmia Rubab, Tuba Hassan
Reserves Amber Kainat, Momina Riasat, Sadaf Shamas, Sidra Amin, Syeda Aroob Shah, Umm-e-Hani
[Cricinfo]
After five successive wins in conditions that weaponised their bowlers and masked their limitations with the bat,Gujarat Titans [GT] found their kryptonite at Eden Gardens. In near-perfect batting conditions, Kilkata Knight Riders [KKR] ran away to 247 for 2, the highest total anyone has ever scored against GT.
Finn Allen set the tone, hitting 10 sixes in 35 balls on his way to an awe-inspiring 93, and Angkrish Raghuvanshi and Cameron Green carried the baton with impressive unbeaten half-centuries. GT had their chances to minimise the punishment they took, but they put down four mostly straightforward catches, including two off Allen.
Everything needed to go right for GT to be able to get to 248; the highest target they had previously chased down was 204. But after a frenetic start in which they rushed to 42 for no loss in three overs, they simply couldn’t keep up with the required rate.
B Sai Sudarshan, who provided much of that early impetus, retired hurt after taking a blow to the elbow, and returned to bat in the 17th over. In between Shubman Gill and Joss Buttler scored half-centuries and put on a 128-run stand for the third wicket. But by the time Sai Sudharsan returned, the match was done and dusted, with GT needing an absurd 71 off 22 balls.
The one man at the ground who could have pulled off that task was relaxing on KKR’s bench: Allen, subbed out at the change of innings. The only sore point of the match for KKR, in the end, concerned the man who came on for Allen. Matheesha Pathirana made his first appearance of the season, but went off the field with a hamstring issue having bowled just 1.2 overs.
At the toss, GT captain Gill suggested that the pitch might start out “sticky” before easing out, and he proved spot-on with his assessment. In the early overs, KKR’s batters couldn’t quite find their timing with Mohammed Siraj and Kagiso Rabada extracting a little bit of seam and a little bit of spongy bounce. The first two overs produced just eight runs.
Allen got going with back-to-back fours off Siraj in the third over – one was off the inside edge – but could have fallen next ball had Jason Holder been able to cling onto a one-hander at extra-cover. Allen was on 14 at that point.
The ball continued to do a little bit through the powerplay, and KKR ended it at 56 for 1, with Allen on 31 off 15 and Raghuvanshi, new to the crease, having shown his intent with a scooped six over his own head off Rabada.
Neither team would have believed they were on top at this stage. The match shifted decisively in KKR’s favour towards the end of the seventh over. Holder got a hard-length ball to climb awkwardly at Allen, and he swatted it straight to long-on, where Siraj put down a sitter. Next ball, Raghuvanshi whipped Holder for a big six over backward square leg.
That was the first of ten sixes that KKR hit over the next 23 legal balls they faced. Allen hit eight of them, and it didn’t matter if he was facing pace or spin. If the ball was remotely in his arc, he used his reach and launched it straight and clean with the purest of bat-swings. If it was remotely short, he rocked back and pulled anywhere in the arc from fine leg to wide long-on.
That frenetic period of play completely cancelled out KKR’s somewhat slow start, and the disadvantage they may have had of batting in the trickiest conditions of the match.
R Sai Kishore, bowling his left-arm spin from over the wicket, got Allen to hole out to deep midwicket in the 12th over, seven short of his second hundred of the season. If GT thought they could breathe a little easier, though, they were wrong, because Green and Raghuvanshi continued to find the boundary regularly.
And GT continued to be generous on the field. Arshad Khan dropped Green on 23 in the 16th over, and Washington Sundar put down a low but eminently catchable chance at deep backward square leg to reprieve Raghuvanshi on 52.
As the innings went deeper, Raghuvanshi began to show his range, hitting Siraj for three sixes in the 19th over – an inside-out loft over extra-cover, a scoop over fine leg, a sweep over backward square – as well as a reverse-swipe for four. Having taken 33 balls to get to his fifty, he scored 29 off his last 11 balls.
Green, meanwhile, reached his fifty off 26 balls, getting there with a slog-sweep off Rashid Khan in the final over, which ran away to the boundary via a misfield. A last-ball overthrow completed GT’s woes, as Raghuvanshi and Green walked off having put on an unbroken 108 off 53 balls.
GT made as good a start as they could have hoped for, but when Sai Sudharsan went off injured at the end of the third over, their momentum began to deflate. First, Pathirana – bowling for the first time this season, and bowling in the powerplay for the first time in his IPL career – sent down a seven-run fourth over. Then Sunil Narine, playing his 200th IPL game, came on and struck first ball, getting Nishant Sindhu – who had been promoted above Buttler to keep the left-right partnership going – to hole out to long-off.
Narine conceded just two runs off that over and bowled four straight balls to Gill without conceding a run off the bat.
Gill hit two sixes off Narine’s next over, but by then GT were already falling well behind the required rate. And this story continued. The good overs – such as the 18-run ninth over bowled by Anukul Roy – were surrounded by not-so-good ones – such as the eighth over, from Varun Chakravarthy, that went for just five. Green and Kartik Tyagi were able to extract bounce and a bit of grip by bowling cutters into the surface, and Buttler struggled for timing against both of them.
When Allen had been at the crease, KKR had four straight overs – from the eighth to the 11th of their innings – that brought them 15 or more runs. GT only had two such overs in the first 14 overs of their innings. Gill hit Varun for two sixes and two fours in that 14th over, but KKR immediately responded by bringing back Narine and bowling out his last two overs.
His first one went for 11, and that was still well short of the 16 an over that GT now needed. And his second – the 17th of the innings – pretty much sealed the game: five runs, and the wicket of Gill, caught on the boundary looking to sweep one of those fast, into-the-pitch, stump-to-stump Narine deliveries that generations of IPL batters have tried and failed to master.
Brief scores:
Kolkata Knight Riders 247 for 2 in 20 overs (Ajinkya Rahane 14, Finn Allen 93, Angkrish Raghuvanshi 82*, Cameron Green 52*; Mohammed Siraj 1-50, Sai Kishore 1-38) beat Gujarat Titans 218 for 4 in 20 overs (Sai Sudharsan 53*, Shubman Gill 85, Jos Buttler 57; Saurabh Dubey 1-23, Cameron Green 1-25, Sunil Narine 2-29) by 29 runs
[Cricinfo]
A Canadian who sailed on the cruise ship MV Hondius which was hit by a hantavirus outbreak in April has tested positive for the disease, officials in the province of British Columbia say.
The individual, one of four people isolating on Vancouver Island after leaving the ship, had developed mild symptoms.
The province’s senior health officer said the four had not had any contact with the public since arriving in Canada.
The case brings the total number of infections to 11, all among cruise passengers. Three people who travelled on the ship have died, with two confirmed to have had the virus.
British Columbia health officer Bonnie Henry said the person’s test came back as a presumptive positive on Friday, meaning that it still remains to be confirmed by a national microbiology lab.
“Clearly, this is not what we hoped for, but it is what we planned for,” she said, quoted by national broadcaster CBC.
“I want to emphasise that hantavirus is a very different virus than the other respiratory viruses that we’ve been dealing with – like Covid, like influenza, like measles – and it remains one that we do not consider to have pandemic potential,” Dr Henry added.
Of the six Canadians who were on the Dutch ship, two are self-isolating at their home in Ontario.
Two more couples are isolating on Vancouver Island, one from British Columbia and the other from Yukon. The person who tested positive is from Yukon.
None of the other five have tested positive so far.
[BBC]
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