Cricket: Krishna take first honours

On Saturday the Malta Cricket Association Winter league commenced, as one may expect in these times the ground was a bit slippery and the playing pitch slightly wet, not enough to stop the two teams Melita C.C and Krishna C.C having one of the most nail biting low scoring games you could be involved in and both teams being bowled out.

Bikram Arora and Mike Caruana opened the innings for Krishna,  making an opening partnership of sixty eight runs until Arora had to retire after facing forty balls in which he made forty seven runs, he was to return later in the innings and added a further nine runs before being lbw.

His innings include two sixes and four fours. Caruana also retired after forty balls only making nineteen runs, he also returned and faced a couple more balls before the innings closed, he did not add to his score.

After these two extras was the highest score with eighteen,  Haroon Majeed and Tony Slater were next highest with eight runs each. The Krishna were bowled out in the last over and after such a good start only managed to total 125 runs. For Melita Andy Naudi took three wickets, Chris Naudi took two while John Prior, Pierre Naudi and Justin Farrin Thorne took a wicket each.  Melita were confident while Krishna were worried.

Too have any chance of a win the Krishna team needed to bowl well. Adam Krishna did just that bowling four overs for only fourteen runs and snapping up a wicket through a wonderful catch by Shaz Nawaz. Nawaz himself created big problems for Melita as he took four wickets.

Melita had a horrible start losing the first three wickets for a combined score of seven. John Grima put things slowly back on track with twenty six runs. Chris Riordan made eleven , while Andy Naudi made twelve. A couple more cheap wickets fell and Melita needed twenty seven runs to win with only Chris Naudi and Eric Krishna at the crease. Naudi had the burden of making all the runs while Eric needed to survive. They were doing a great job and in the final over they needed eight runs to win.

The first ball Naudi hit the ball towards the boundary and called for two runs. Majeed fielded the ball and threw to the bowlers end to which Eric was running. Waseem met the throw five meters away from the stumps turned and threw down the stumps and Krishna win the game. Krishna earned fourteen points for the win while Melita Earned two.

Next Saturday Krishna take on Marsa in the Winter league. Saturday morning the Sunoco Cricket Academy will be from 9:00 till 10:30am.