LANCASHIRE V SACA – MATCH REPORTS (30 Jun 26)

MATCH ONE RESULT: SACA WON BY 7 RUNS

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MATCH TWO RESULT: NO RESULT

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SACA were back in T20 action again yesterday, with a double header on the cards against Lancashire, played at the first-class county’s new state-of-the-art ‘second ground’ and high-performance training centre at Farington in Preston.

After coming out on the wrong end of some close T20 encounters in recent weeks, SACA were keen to get back to winning ways...

GAME ONE MATCH REPORT

SACA batted first in the opening encounter of the day, but found it hard going, as on a deck that offered a fair amount of assistance to the Lancashire bowlers, the batters struggled to score with any freedom.

Feroze Khushi and Daniyal Khan had the honour of opening for SACA, although in just the second over, having hit 12 off 10 deliveries, Khan lofted a drive to mid-off, with SACA losing their first wicket on 13.

Hisham Khan (4 off 9), Aum Patel (1 off 5) Omar Akram (1 off 4) and Mohammed (5 off 9) all struggled to get to grips with the challenging surface, and it was telling that with SACA on 63 for 5 at the halfway stage of their innings, only one batter had scored at more than a run a ball.

It was clear that it wasn’t going to be a big scoring day, and anything above 120 looked like being a par score, although that didn’t deter opener Khushi, who was the exception, as he remained at the crease and kept building as his partners came and went.

A useful 21 off 20 balls from Shareeq Sheikh gave the innings some momentum, as he and Khushi added 40 for the sixth wicket, and Thilan Walallawita’s handy unbeaten 11 from 10 added a further 26 with Khushi for the seventh wicket, as SACA posted 129 for 6 in their allotted 20 overs.

Khushi saw things through to the end, finishing unbeaten on 69*, scored off 54 balls, in an innings that included three fours and two sixes. In the context of the game, where others had struggled, it was a quite magnificent effort from the opener!

Whilst SACA had only posted a low total, all the bowlers would need to do was bowl in the right areas and they’d get the same assistance as the Lancashire bowlers benefitted from, and so it proved, as Lancashire were restricted to just 41 in the opening six powerplay overs.

Two powerplay wickets fell, one to Hisham Khan and one to Eesa Nadeem, as SACA strangled run scoring opportunities with some well-disciplined line and length bowling.

Just 23 runs came off the next six overs, for the loss of two further wickets; one to Walallawita and one to Mohammed Rizvi, as the Lancashire batters struggled to get the ball away, as their required run rate began to climb, with the score on 64 for 4 after 12 overs.

Lancashire’s number Ollie Sutton, and number six Ben Walkden, tried to up the run rate, to some success, and their partnership of 59 had taken the score to 106 when Sutton fell for 33 off 30, off the first ball of the eighteenth over, with Nadeem picking up his second wicket, leaving Lancashire needing 24 runs off the remaining 17 balls of the innings.

Nadeem saw the over out, conceding only two more runs, with Hisham Khan going for 8 off the penultimate over, to leave Lancashire needing 14 runs from the final over of the game for victory.

Nadeem, bowling his final over, held his nerve, restricting Lancashire to just six, to see SACA secure the win, by a margin of seven runs.

Walallawita’s figures of 2 for 17 off 4 overs narrowly overshone Nadeem’s who finished with 2 for 25 from his allotted four.

GAME TWO MATCH REPORT

Game two saw Lancashire batting first, although with grey clouds gathering menacingly above, prospects of the game going the full distance were looking increasingly unlikely.

Hisham Khan and Wasim Khan took the new ball, and wasted no time getting into the wickets, with Lancashire’s Harris (4), Bell (1), and Kennedy (7) all dismissed inside the first three overs of the innings.

In a familiar pattern to the SACA innings in game one, much like Khushi had done for SACA, Lancashire had opener Keshana Fonseca to thank for holding their innings together, as the opener hit 64 from 45 balls, whilst chaos ensued at the other end.

Walallawita then joined in the fun, picking up the wicket of Sutton for 2, as Lancashire finished the powerplay overs four wickets down.

Fonseca was playing a solo hand, scoring freely where others struggled, bringing up his fifty off just 32 balls, and his efforts had pushed the run rate along nicely, with Lancashire sat on 77 for 4 after nine overs.

Rizvi struck in the tenth over, to see off Walkden for 18, and with Hamidullah Qadri, the pair wrestled back control for SACA with some tight overs in the middle overs of the innings, and when Quadri got his reward in the 15^th over, removing Stanley for 10, Lancashire were on 107 for 6 with five overs remaining.

Another wicket for Rizvi removed Childs for 11, and Hisham Khan picked up his third in the next over, removing the dangerous Fonseca for 64, as Lancashire finished their innings on 137 for 8.

The break between innings was the sign for the heavens to open, and after an hour of waiting with no chance of a resumption, the umpires were left with little choice but to call play off just after 5pm, with the match ending in a no result.

SACA HIGHLIGHTS FROM LANCASHIRE T20s

Batting:                                                                        

Feroze Khushi                69* (54)

Bowling:

Hisham Khan                4-0-26-3

Thilan Walallawita      4-0-17-2

Mohammed Rizvi        4-0-19-2

Eesa Nadeem               4-0-25-2