Today's Edition
Abu Dhabi (Aletihad)
Morrisville Samp Army marched past Delhi Bulls by four wickets in the Abu Dhabi T10 at the Zayed Cricket Stadium. It was the first loss for Bulls in their fourth game of the tournament.
In the second and most exciting game of the day, Bangla Tigers pulled back Northern Warriors for a great morale-boosting timely win. Chasing a target of 138, Northern Warriors were running away with the match with 100 up in six overs, but they still fell short by two runs.
Hazratullah Zazai’s knock of 57 runs from just 20 balls went in vain despite James Neesham’s 23 not out at the other end.
Earlier, Bangla batsmen clicked as a unit. David Miller made a breezy 50 from 24 balls, and put up a 67-run partnership in 29 balls with Dasun Shanaka (14 n.o). Opener Jordan Cox hit a quickfire 35 off 16 balls and Kusal Mendis chipped in a 10-ball knock of 20 runs.
Delhi Bulls were restricted to 95 for 8 through fine spells from Jason Holder (3 for 15) and Salman Irshad (3 for 14).
Samp Army then rode to victory with two balls to spare with Faf Du Plessis top-scoring with 30 runs and Najibullah Zadran hitting a timely unbeaten 25.
Samp Army captain Moeen Ali elected to field first, and the bowlers backed him up. Opening with the ball himself, Moeen was hit for 19 runs in his two overs. The Bulls batsmen kept ticking away with the big shots in each over while the bowlers kept chipping away on the wickets column.
When the final push was due in the last two overs, Holder took took two wickets and Salman Irshad also bowled a tight one at the end to leave Bulls a few runs short of a challenging total.
In their chase, Samp Army also looked on course, with Faf du Plessis’ 30 from 17 balls before his exit largely keeping them in reach distance with three overs to go. After Richard Gleeson gave away 11 runs, the match was still balanced but Dwayne Bravo gave away only five runs and took two wickets to leave Samp Army sweating. However, Najibullah Zadran hit a six, two and four off successive deliveries to settle the matter.
