Titans trounce Warriors in final
ONE-DAY CUP: HIGHEST EVER DOMESTIC 50-OVER SCORE
Visitors challenge ended after 31 overs, giving the Centurion side victory by a massive 236 runs.
Free-scoring centuries from openers Aiden Markram and Henry Davids carried the Titans to the easiest of victories in the Momentum One-Day Cup final against the Warriors at Centurion last night as they posted the highest ever score in domestic 50-over cricket.
Having won the toss and elected to bat, Markram and Davids scored 212 off 183 balls for the first wicket, the Warriors’ inability to break the partnership allowing them to inexorably accelerate towards their total of 425/5, beating their own record of 415/3 set against the Highveld Lions at the Wanderers two weeks ago.
Even without AB de Villiers, who pulled out of the final earlier in the day with a sore back, the Titans batting juggernaut simply blew the Warriors away.
Davids, back after missing a couple of games with a hamstring injury, took a while to get going but was then at his free-scoring best as he struck an 86-ball century and eventually finished with 114 off 98 deliveries, as good an innings as you’ll get in a final.
It left him with 673 runs in eight innings in this campaign, a Titans record and the fifth-highest tally ever, although those ahead of him all played between 11 and 14 innings.
Davids fell in the 30th over, caught off the tidy spin of Jon-Jon Smuts, but Markram then cut loose as he blazed his way to 161 off 123 balls, an innings that confirmed the 22-year-old’s class.
There was a fine cameo from Heinrich Klaasen (60 off 50), before Chris Morris broke loose in the closing stages with an astonishing 47 not out off just a dozen deliveries that carried the Titans to their record score.
Morris then made life difficult for the Warriors batsmen with the new ball, bowling Gihahn Cloete for three in his first over, and when Lungi Ngidi removed Colin Ingram (1) and Smuts (13) the Warriors’ challenge was dead.
Jerry Nqolo top-scored with 40 before he was caught off Markram, with the Warriors challenge ending after 31 overs on 189 all out, giving the Titans victory by 236 runs, the second biggest winning margin in the tournament’s history.
Wrist-spinner Tabraiz Shamsi finished with outstanding figures of three for 31 in nine overs, while there were two wickets apiece for Junior Dala, Morris and Ngidi.