Kuumar Shyam (Aletihad)

Bas de Leede’s fine three wicket spell and a responsible unbeaten knock of 31 from Dewald Brevis lead Morrinsville Samp Army’s march to the top of the table defeating New York Strikers by six wickets on Thursday.

The last league match ensured pride of placing and saw Morrisville display their tight bowling strength to bowl out New York for a paltry 70 runs in 9.4 overs.

New York tried to put up a fight back through Ali Khan’s two wicket spell for 16 but that was not enough to prevent Morrisville from winning the match with 18 balls to spare. Brevis’ unbeaten 31 came off 18 balls with five boundaries. 

Samp Army will take on New York Strikers in the first qualifier in the first match while third-placed Deccan Gladiators will take on Bangla Tigers in the eliminator. The winner of the eliminator and the loser from the first qualifier will play in Qualifier 2. The team to emerge from it will take on the winner from the first Qualifier for the trophy.

Slowly and steadily towards the business end of the league round, Bangla honed into the final play-off spot position with a timely win over Chennai Braves, and the other contender Delhi Bulls capitulating to Team Abu Dhabi in the day’s earlier match. 

The Bangla Tigers oscillated from seventh spot out of the eight franchises to even second at one stage. Starting Thursday in fifth spot, a 27-run victory over Chennai was great but still not enough on net run rate calculations, had they come into play.

An error occurred while retrieving the Tweet. It might have been deleted.


However, Team Abu Dhabi did Bangla Tigers a favour by beating Delhi to register their first win in seven matches. 
The host team managed to only barely end their six-game losing streak, making rough weather of scoring six runs required from the final over despite Kyle Mayers' 61-run knock off 30 balls. Delhi elected to bat and made 97 for 3, but a defeat restricted them in the fifth place on the table with six points, and Bangla went through. 

Bangla also got a fresh impetus, too, with the arrival of attacking India batsman Robin Uthappa, now a resident of Dubai. Uthappa smashed a quickfire 20 runs, and along with Kusal Mendis (32) and Dasun Shanaka (34), provided Bangla Tigers a strong total of 126 for 5. Though Mohammad Nabi bagged three wickets for 15 runs, Chennai could not restrain their run flow. 

With the help of tight bowling, led by Ajman resident and the left-arm spinner Haider Ali (two wickets for 17 runs), Bangla restricted Chennai to 99 for 6 in 10 overs. 

Earlier, Uthappa had set the tempo by attacking the veteran spinner Imran Tahir from the word go. However, the UAE's leading bowler Junaid Siddique then had Uthappa caught by Tahir at short fine leg. Tahir also got hit for two sixes and a boundary by Shanaka in the seventh over to take Bangla's score to 80 for 3. 

Mendis took two boundaries off Siddique for 15 runs in the eighth over. Bangla captain Benny Howell then made McCoy bleed 24 runs, including two sixes and a boundary, off the final over. Howell came back to open the bowling and set the tone for the chase with a wicket, putting pressure on the Chennai team which they never managed to overcome.