Ken Borland

The Nashua Titans scored a crucial bonus point as they won their MiWay T20 Challenge match against the Chevrolet Warriors by eight wickets with five balls to spare at SuperSport Park in Centurion on Wednesday.

 – http://www.supersport.com/cricket/domestic-t20/news/120321/Titans_win_get_home_playoff

The Titans were set a Duckworth/Lewis-adjusted target of 60 in 11 overs to win the match, but they needed to reach that total in 8.4 overs in order to earn a bonus point and a home playoff against the Central Knights.

With Martin van Jaarsveld scoring 23 off 18 balls and Faf du Plessis 22 not out off 18 balls, the Titans passed their target in just 7.5 overs.

With nothing to lose and so much to gain, it was a merry old bash for the Titans from the moment they came out to bat after a two-hour rain delay.

Henry Davids did not last long after a rather meek prod at a Rusty Theron in-swinger that trapped him lbw for a single, but Van Jaarsveld played some punishing strokes, collecting two fours and a six before off-spinner Johan Botha zipped a delivery past his shins and into off stump.

Du Plessis and Farhaan Behardien (13*) then finished the job without too much fuss.

It was the Titans bowlers who had opened the gate for them to snatch second place on the log, with the Warriors top-order floundering against an inspired seam attack.

The Titans attack had reduced the Warriors to a miserable 64 for six in 14 overs when rain ended the visitors’ innings, with Alfonso Thomas (2-0-11-2) and Albie Morkel (2-0-4-2) retiring to the changeroom with the most striking figures.

The Warriors had won the toss and elected to bat first, only for their top-order to disappoint, as they crashed from 35 without loss to 53 for six before Simon Harmer (9*) and Athenkosi Dyili (3*), the last two recognised batsmen, added 11 runs, the joint second-biggest partnership of the innings.

Openers Ashwell Prince (10) and Wayne Parnell (23) had staged the largest partnership of the innings as they put on 35 for the first wicket, but they were both dismissed in the space of three deliveries.

The Titans were somewhat under the cosh as the clean-striking Parnell rushed to his 23 runs off 16 balls, stroking four fours and a six, but the initially wayward Ethy Mbhalati made the breakthrough.

Having conceded eight runs from his first four balls, Mbhalati changed his line to over the wicket on to off stump and bowled a fuller, slower delivery at Parnell. The left-hander unfurled the big drive, but was hopelessly early on the shot, skying the ball high to deep mid-off, where Thomas took the catch.

Thomas himself removed Prince and Davey Jacobs for a duck in the next over, the fifth, as the Warriors crashed to 38 for three.

The delivery to remove Jacobs was particularly good. Pitching just outside off stump, the law of T20 states that the batsmen has to go for it and Jacobs pushed firmly, but bounce and away movement found the edge of the bat and Van Jaarsveld took the catch at slip.

International Morkel was the next to make his presence felt, trapping Colin Ingram (5) lbw with a delivery that looked to be going down the offside, and then zeroing in on the stumps of Botha (7) with a beauty that was angling in towards leg, before nipping away and hitting off stump.

The Warriors were stumbling like drunkards in a dark alley and it was only getting worse with the rain saving them from further misery.

The introduction of Roelof van der Merwe brought another wicket, the left-arm spinner zipping a delivery that also bounced appreciably on to the edge of Craig Thyssen’s bat, wicketkeeper Heino Kuhn comfortably taking the tricky catch.

Thyssen was yet another batsman who failed, scoring just three from seven balls.

The Titans were desperate to get back on to the field as, after several failed attempts to qualify for the Champions League, they were well-placed to earn a crucial bonus point against the Warriors and therefore host the qualifying playoff against the Central Knights.

The bonus point has indeed moved the Titans up to second on the final log.

Faf du Plessis took ownership of the run-chase as he steered the Nashua Titans to a six-wicket victory over the Nashua Mobile Cape Cobras in their MiWay T20 Challenge match at SuperSport Park in Centurion on Sunday.

 – http://www.supersport.com/cricket/domestic-t20/news/120318/Faf_the_owner_of_the_runchase

Du Plessis finished with an unbeaten 38 off 27 balls as the 27-year-old continues to live up to his tag as one of the best finishers in South Africa, taking the Titans to their target of 157 with nine balls to spare.

Farhaan Behardien was with him at the end on 12 not out, scoring the winning runs with a tremendous six over extra cover off left-arm paceman Beuran Hendricks.

The target could have been a tricky one on a two-paced pitch against a Cobras attack that only had one quickish bowler and four spinners, but Henry Davids (24 off 17), Roelof van der Merwe (18 off 13) and Martin van Jaarsveld (24 off 18) provided the attacking impetus that gave the likes of Heino Kuhn (25 off 26), Du Plessis and Berhardien the freedom to play sensibly without taking risks.

The openers – Davids and Kuhn – gave the innings the ideal start as they added 48 in six overs. Davids showed great hands as he drove the ball inside-out superbly, collecting two sixes and a four in his 24.

Davids fell when he charged down the pitch and missed a slash at legspinner Alistair Gray, and Kuhn departed two overs later when he top-edged a reverse-sweep at offspinner Dane Piedt and was caught at short third man.

Justin Kemp and Dane Vilas combined superbly to dismiss Van der Merwe, although there was some doubt as to whether the batsman actually gloved a surprise bouncer that was brilliantly taken by the wicketkeeper standing up to the stumps.

There might have been some concern in the Titans camp with the score 74 for three at the halfway mark, but captain Van Jaarsveld threw the bat at anything remotely wide as he collected four fours off 18 balls.

Van Jaarsveld was stumped by Vilas off Gray in the 15th over, but with just 35 runs still needed, the Cobras knew their hopes of staying in contention for the playoffs were almost gone.

Du Plessis and Behardien calmly finished the match at the behest of their appreciative home crowd, but the Titans’ failure to secure the bonus point means their hopes of finishing top of the log and hosting the final are gone.

Even if the Titans get a bonus-point win over the Warriors on Wednesday, they can only draw level with the Lions’ current total of 35 points.

The applicable tie-breaker then is the results of matches between the Lions and the Titans, with both teams having seven outright wins overall. Unfortunately for Matthew Maynard’s team, the Lions won both of their round-robin contests.

Wrist-spinner Brad Hogg was the best of the Cobras bowlers, conceding just 16 runs in his four overs, but the visitors obviously lacked quality back-up and four spinners was perhaps overkill.

The Nashua Mobile Cape Cobras had earlier made run-scoring look difficult as they cobbled together 156 for six, although there were certainly hints of inconsistent bounce and spinners Eden Links and Van der Merwe both obtained noticeable turn.

Richard Levi more often than not makes run-scoring look easy when he charges at the top of the innings, and he bashed a quickfire 25 off 13 balls to give the Cobras a good start after they had won the toss and elected to bat.

The Cobras were 30 without loss after three overs thanks to Levi, but the Titans fought back as they claimed three wickets and conceded just 37 more runs in the next seven overs.

Albie Morkel removed Levi with his first ball, Behardien hanging on to a rocket of a catch at cover, and Yaseen Vallie (6) and Owais Shah (12) both fell cheaply as they misjudged slower balls from Alfonso Thomas and Morkel respectively.

Stiaan van Zyl and Vilas steadied the innings as they added 26 off 27 balls for the fourth wicket, before Van Zyl was bowled by Van der Merwe for 33, backing away and trying to deliver a big hit.

The Titans were in control as Morkel stood at the top of his mark at the Hennops River End with the Cobras on 120 for five after 18 overs.

But having bowled so well previously, taking two for 10 in three overs, Morkel’s final over was the one that allowed the visitors to substantially up their run-rate, Vilas and Kemp taking 27 runs from it.

The first ball of the over was up to the bat and driven majestically over cow-corner for six by Vilas, and even the Titans crowd clapped when Kemp pulled the last two balls of the over for sixes in the same vicinity.

It meant Morkel finished the innings with tired old figures of two for 37 in four overs, but the Cobras were still up against it at the other end, where Thomas closed with two overs for 13 runs and picked up the wicket of Kemp, who hit a slower-ball full toss off the toe of the bat, slapping a return catch.

Kemp’s 24 off 18 balls was a crucial contribution, but the real hero of the Cobras innings was Vilas, whose 48 not out off 28 balls was a top-class innings.

His composure and a talent for hitting boundaries in the closing overs provided a mighty boost to the innings as he collected four fours and two sixes.

The Titans bowling was a mixed bag. Ethy Mbhalati, Morkel and Van der Merwe were all expensive, while Links, David Wiese and Du Plessis bowled seven overs for 46 runs between them. Thomas’s figures of two for 22 in four overs took the cake, however.

The BidVest Wanderers pitch is dangerous and unplayable, so the umpires have abandoned the MiWay T20 Challenge match between the bizhub Highveld Lions and Sunfoil Dolphins in Johannesburg on Friday.

http://www.supersport.com/cricket/domestic-t20/news/120316/LionsDolphins_match_abandoned

Reserve umpire Dennis Smith told SuperSport.com that the pitch was still too wet after two days of rain and the process of sweating under the covers. Dangerous divots were being formed where the ball pitched and a number of deliveries had already spat up viciously or come slowly off the surface.

The Lions had made their way to 24 for two in six overs after being sent in to bat when umpires Murray Brown, Adrian Holdstock and Smith abandoned the match.

Jonathan Vandiar (6) had skied a pull off Fidel Edwards high to deep mid-on, where Robbie Frylinck took a well-judged catch.

Quinton de Kock scored two before he tried to push Frylinck away on the leg-side, but the ball got stuck in the pitch, the batsman being far too early on the shot, and the ball came off the back of the bat and looped high to deep backward point.

Gulam Bodi was not out on 10 and Neil McKenzie had yet to face a ball when the umpires, their chief concern being the safety of the players on a thoroughly unpredictable surface, called the match off.

The No Result continues the unbelievably wretched luck of the Dolphins, who had four successive games washed out and then lost their previous outing against the Chevrolet Knights when rain intervened.

The two teams will earn two points each, which means the Lions will have to lose their last league fixture, against the New Age Impi in Benoni on Wednesday, and the Knights or Titans record two bonus-point victories for them to be overtaken at the top of the log.

It was no surprise to Dolphins coach Lance Klusener on Thursday when he arrived in Johannesburg and saw the rain that has all but vanquished his team’s MiWay T20 Challenge hopes had followed them up to the Highveld.

Klusener’s side are in Johannesburg to take on the powerful Highveld Lions in Johannesburg on Friday and have to win with a bonus point and hope other results go their way to maintain their interest in the playoffs.

The coach was accompanied to Gauteng by the same squad that lost on Wednesday night to the Knights by just eight runs after rain intervened and the Duckworth/Lewis calculations failed to favour the Dolphins.

That followed a run of four consecutive wash-outs, but Klusener was philosophical as he surveyed the soggy view outside his Johannesburg hotel window on Thursday.

“We’re pretty much stuffed, we can’t fight the umpires, the opposition and then the weather on top of all that! I think we had the run-chase set up against the Knights but the rain swirled around and came back, which was unfortunate.

“But we’ll come out smoking against the Lions and we need to pursue whatever slim chances we have to make the playoffs,” Klusener told The Witness.

Klusener said the Dolphins’ work in the field against the Knights had pleased him, especially the fine debut made by Prenelan Subrayen, who took two for 13 in four excellent overs of off-spin.

“I’m very happy for him because he’s travelled around with us for a while without getting a game. We did really well in the field, especially after the start the Knights made.”

The Lions are comfortably on top of the log after winning seven of their 10 matches and one of the keys to beating them will be to take regular wickets against an in-form top-order that has seen Quinton de Kock, Neil McKenzie, Gulam Bodi and Jonathan Vandiar all shining with the bat.

But the Dolphins will firstly be looking to solve their own top-order batting woes, with a good start being essential against an attack that boasts the leading wicket-taker in Chris Morris and two threatening left-arm fast bowlers in Australian Dirk Nannes and Pakistan’s Sohail Tanveer.

Dolphins squad – Loots Bosman, Cameron Delport, Imraan Khan, Cody Chetty, Vaughn van Jaarsveld, David Miller, Daryn Smit (wk), Kyle Abbott, Robbie Frylinck, Prenelan Subrayen, Fidel Edwards, Mthokozisi Shezi, Ahmed Amla.