Second win for Spartans in U-16 Youth League
dubai — Spartans recorded their second successive win after they outplayed Trojans by 99 runs, while Gladiators suffered their second straight defeat when going down to Titans in the Dubai Cricket Council’s Evolve U-16 Youth League that was played at The 7s ground in Dubai on Thursday night.
Put into bat, Spartans were once again given a rock-solid start by their openers Mohammed Ali Mirza and Rudra Mahadev. The duo stitched an 86-run partnership with Rudra the dominant of the two scoring at a brisk rate. His 53 came off only 34 balls and contained eight fours.
Mirza, who was the player of Spartans’ opening match win against Titans, contributed 32 from 42 balls after finding the ropes on three occasions.
A couple of wickets from Ali Nasser (2-32) and Ammar Badami (2-23) put Spartans slightly on the back foot but Karan Zaveri and Rishik Janaswamy brought them back into the match. Karan struck a run-a-ball 24 (3x4) and Rishik hit two sixes and a four for his 25 from 18 balls to boost the team’s total to 179. Raed Ali chipped in with 12 from 12.
Trojans, who were impressive against Gladiators the previous day, just fell apart in their chase and were bowled out for a meagre 80.
Raed Ali was the wrecker in chief with four wickets to be named the player of the match.
In another U-16 match which was closely fought, player of the match Aakash Radhakrishnan (82 from 65 balls, 9x4) and Harsha Bobade (34 not out from 25 balls, 3x4) added some crucial 87 runs for the fourth wicket which proved to be the turning point as Titans posted 176 for 4.
Gladiators had barely managed 64 in their first match against Spartans and were expected to lose by yet another big margin but Kushal Chiluka (36) and Dhruv Parashar (44) kept them in the chase.
Later Yuvraj Jaisingh threw caution to the wind with two sixes and five fours to bring Gladiators to within striking distance. But his 60 off 38 balls proved futile in the end as the team fell short by nine runs.
Four teams — Spartans, Titans, Trojans and Gladiators — will battle it out in a single round-robin league over ten days with the best two teams making the final on May 8.
Spartans beat Trojans by 99 runs Spartans 179 for 6 in 25 overs (Rudra Mahadev 53, Mohammed Ali Mirza 32, Rishik Janaswamy 25, Karan Zaveri 24; Ali Nasser 2-32, Ammar Badami 2-23, Darshan Pagarani 1-4) Trojans 80 all out in 24.3 overs (Marlon Malcolm 20, Kai Smith 17; Raed Ali 4-21, Rishik Janaswamy 1-9, Hardik Pai 1-13, Nilansh Keswani 1-9, Mohammed Ali Mirza 1-6, Siddharth Raina 1-1). Player of the match: Raed Ali. Titans beat Gladiators by 8 runs Titans 176 for 4 in 25 overs (Aakash Radhakrishnan 82, Harsh Bobade 34 n.o., Ahaan Fernandes 20, Shival Bawa 17; Jash Giyanani 1-30, Yuvraj Jaisingh 1-34, Arvindan Sundaram 1-20) Gladiators 168 for 7 in 25 overs (Yuvraj Jaisingh 60 n.o., Dhruv Parashar 44, Kushal Chiluka 36; Vedant Deshpande 1-29, Harsh Bobade 1-32, Vinayak Vijayan 1-28). Player of the match: Aakash Radhakrishnan.