Sabir and Raza fire Alubond to victory
abu dhabi — Ghulam Sabir (62 not out) and Hasan Raza (29) steered Alubond Tigers to a resounding eight-wicket victory over Ibsons to reach semifinals of the UBL Twenty20 Cup.
Chasing a score of 128, Alubond lost their openers Shahid Siddique (6) and the UAE international Rohan Mustafa (4) cheaply but the third wicket pair took charge to see them through with almost four overs to spare. Earlier, Sharif Asad and Sultan Ahmed, the new ball bowlers, did most of the damage by claiming five wickets between them to restrict Ibsons to 128 for nine after they were put in to bat at the Zayed stadium.
Joining them in the last four were Danube Lions, Interface Transworld and United Bank Limited.
Half centuries from Adnan Mufti and UAE international Mohammed Shahzad paved the way for Danube’s convincing 66-run win over New Medical Centre. Farhan Babar stroked an unbeaten 61 to guide Interface to a six-wicket win with nine balls to spare over Abu Dhabi Airport Company and UBL were given a fright by Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank before pulling off victory by 10 runs.
Dawood Ijaz hit a breezy 64 and took two wickets while Zaheer Maqsood bagged four for 24 to star for UBL.
Brief scores
>Alubond Tigers 129 for 2 in 16.1 overs
(Ghulam Sabir 62 not out, Hasan Raza 29 not out) bt Ibsons 128 for 9 in 20 overs (Waseem Baig 51, Sharif Asad 3-23, Sultan Ahmed 2-5).
>Danube Lions 183 for 6 in 20 overs
(Adnan Mufti 58, Mohammed Shahzad 56, Mir Waiz 3-17) bt New Medical Centre 117 for 8 in 20 overs (Sandeep Shetty 30, Aamir Hayat 2-16, Riaz Afridi 2-21).