Balochistan defeat Sindh in Pentangular Cup
Balochistan defeated Sindh by 127 runs in a first round fixture of the Faysal Bank Pentangular Cup 2010-11 in Lahore. It was an emphatic victory by Balochistan considering their past performances however, the inclusion of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Multan-c819 Region’s players in their lineup has given them a huge boost. On the other hand, Sindh is a strong team which is full of stars, but they will be disappointed with their performance in the first match.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Khalid-Latif-c71261 won the toss for Sindh at the Lahore City Cricket Association (LCCA) Ground and elected to bowl first on a track that was expected to offer a lot of help to the spinners. It was quite a surprising decision considering the fact that it is always wise to bowl last on a turning track and Sindh eventually had to pay the price.
Balochistan got off to a good start through their openers as Abid Ali and Shoaib Khan gave their team a 51 run opening stand. After the departure of the openers, Balochistan lost wickets at regular intervals and as a result they were bowled out for a mediocre score of 173 runs in only the 39th over of the innings. The majority of the batsmen failed to convert their starts into big knocks. http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Naved-Yasin-c2081 remained the top scorer with an unbeaten 25 runs.
Off spinner http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Danish-Kaneria-c1314 also claimed four scalps.
In their first innings, Sindh produced a disappointing batting performance as the whole team was bundled out for a mere 105 runs. Sindh’s star-studded batting lineup simply failed to cope with Balochistan’s impressive bowling. As a result Sindh conceded a 68-run first innings lead to Balochistan. Ironically, Danish Kaneria was the top scorer for Sindh with 25 runs.
Captain Abdur Rauf claimed four wickets for Balochistan and led his team from the front, whereas Mohammad Irfan, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Zulfiqar-Babar-c98673 picked up a couple of wickets each.
Balochistan came up with a much better batting effort second time round and piled up a very good score of 294 runs on the board courtesy of a brilliant partnership between Naved Yasin and http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Sohaib-Maqsood-c90627. The latter remained the top scorer for Balochistan with 87 runs whereas the left hander Yasin scored an impressive 69. Both of them have been consistent performers at national level and are knocking on the doors of national selection.
Test cricketers Danish Kaneria and Sohail Khan picked up four and three wickets respectively. http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Tanvir-Ahmed-c92718 also chipped in with a couple of scalps for Sindh.
Chasing a huge target of 363 runs in the last innings of the match, Sindh batted much better in their second innings but were not good enough to match the brilliance of Balochistan in the end. All the middle order batsmen got off starts but failed to carry on and as a result Sindh was bowled out for 235 runs to give Balochistan a memorable win.
Zulfiqar Babar remained the pick of the bowlers for Balochistan as he took four wickets. He has been representing http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 ‘A’ recently and is considered a strong contender for national selection. Sohaib Maqsood displayed his all-round skills as he picked up three wickets to compliment his superb effort with the bat in the second innings.
It was quite a poor performance from Sindh, considering the fact that they had the services of Test batsmen like http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Fawad-Alam-c56883 and Khurram Manzoor. However, they can still get their act together in the upcoming fixtures of the Pentangular Cup.
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