Kowloon Cricket Club - Match Reports

One of the largest crowds of the season descended on KCC for the title decider between KCC and Lamma in the inaugural Elton Education HKCA Women’s League.

On a sultry day when the promised showers thankfully failed to materialise, a young (with one or two notable exceptions!) Lamma side proved far too powerful for their more mature opponents. With five “locals” in the side (including junior league coaches), Lamma pave the way for the women’s game in Hong Kong, and are deserved winners of a championship which may next year be boosted by the addition of a side from the progressive and ambitious Little Sai Wan club.

The women’s game in Hong Kong is bestridden by two colossuses, Neisha Pratt of Lamma and Natasha Miles of Hong Kong Cricket Club, and it was fitting that both should be gracing the turf of Hong Kong’s premier cricket venue – Neisha as captain of Lamma, Natasha, impossible to keep out of the action, popping up as substitute fielder. A contrast in styles – Neisha, the street fighting Kiwi scarred by dives on the bone hard surface of Po Kong Village Road, attempting run outs while flat on her back, Natasha, Goweresque grace, gliding across the turf and trying out flashy flicks – each acts as a talisman for their team and helps raise standards in the women's game.

That was demonstrated by the support given to Neisha as she ran up a marvellous undefeated 148 (albeit dropped four times), by Walter Ma, a natural athlete who only took up the game this year, and Kylie Knott, struggling at first to cope with the wily bowling of Sarah Eames, Julie Atkinson and Emily Hirst with her frog-in-a-blender action, as well as with the consequences of a hard Friday night on the town. At the completion of their 35 overs, Lamma had scored at more than 7 an over, running up an impressive 258-3.

In reply, KCC (short of key players) were never in the hunt after skipper Julie was dismissed cheaply. A couple of run outs underlined the visiting team’s superior fitness and technical ability, and it was left to Sarah to anchor the innings to give her team some respectability in defeat. This she did with a patient knock of 57 before fittingly Neisha clean bowled the last batter with the last ball of the day to give her figures of 5-7 off 9 overs.

As the handsome trophy was handed over by Mark Burns, and as the camaraderie that had been evident on the field intensified off it, with Chardonay and Champagne the order of the day, one could only reflect on the state of health of the women’s game in Hong Kong. Let us hope that next season their contribution to the local cricket scene is reflected in at least a couple of games being played away from the arid wasteland that is PKVR2.

Match Report and Photos from Lamma CC

At KCC: Lamma 261-3 (Neisha Pratt 148*) beat KCC 118 (Sarah Eames 57; Neisha Pratt 9-3-7-5) by 143 runs

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Saturday Cup - Final: Saturday, 30th April 2005

Saracens v. Kai Tak at Mission Road
Result: Saracens lost by 62 runs

Following a comprehensive 6 wicket defeat of this year’s League Champions, Little Sai Wan, the Saracens entered the Saturday Cup Final in buoyant mood. Unfortunately, the Final against Kai Tak was scheduled for 30 April which meant that two long-standing players, Rahul Sharma and Yarman Vachha, were not available, with the former representing Hong Kong in Nepal.

Winning the toss on an overcast day, the skipper inserted the opposition hoping that the new ball bowlers, Dave Cross and Rohan Boghani, would extract plenty of movement. For some inexplicable reason, this did not materialize and Kai Tak got off to a “flying” start. However, once the third wicket fell at 131, the Saracens bowlers got back on top and from 169 – 7, Kai Tak should have been all out for 202 had their last batsman walked. Unfortunately, the last pair put on 44 to leave Kai Tak with 246. All of the bowlers stuck to their task well and took wickets – Dave 1, Rohan 4, Ravi 2 and young Nigel Shroff 2. The Saracens strength in the cup competition has been the fielding and the Final was no exception with Zubi Nizami and Paul Pratt in particular, taking great catches in the deep.

Chasing an eminently gettable score on a placid Mission Road track, Saracens unfortunately lost Ravi early on . Despite an excellent 95 run second wicket partnership between Dyutesh Chaudhuri (80) and Jonathan King (26), wickets continued to fall regularly with no substantial partnerships being seen – and this includes the Captain Of Cricket’s golden duck! Saracens were eventually all out for 184 when Shiroy Vachha took his usual heave across the line and the ball found the inside edge of his bat and trickled onto the stumps.

Despite losing on the day, there was plenty to celebrate and the team adjourned to the Club for beer and curry with the youngsters enjoying the odd glass of Coke + ?. And everyone watched in amazement as Dave performed his magical exploding beer glass trick.

My thanks to Gayle for scoring and to Clive Howard and Hugh Tyrwitt-Drake for umpiring. It made such a difference to have two knowledgeable and official umpires standing. Thanks gents. And a final thank you to all the players who turned my last season around. It has been so much fun over the years playing for Saracens and I have been very fortunate to have met so many wonderful people.

- ROB GILL

At Mission Road (played 30.04.05): Kai Tak 246-9 (S Campbell 41, T Patidar 44, M Brown 52, Mohsen Naqvi 45*; R Boghani 10-0-105-4) beat Saracens 184 (D Chaudhuri 80; C Beattie 6-0-36-3; C Williams 8-0-53-3) by 62 runs

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Saturday Cup - Semi-Final: Saturday, 23rd April 2005

Saracens v. LSW Warriors at KCC
Result: Saracens won by 6 wkts

At KCC: Saracens 103-4 (D Chaudhuri 38, R Sharma 40; Mohanna Marzook 4-1-11-4) beat LSW Warriors 102 (Munir Dar 40; R Sujanani 10-2-29-3, Y Vachha 5.5-0-13-3) by 6 wkts

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Saturday Cup - Quarter-Finals: Saturday, 9th April 2005

Tartars v. Police at PTS
Result: Tartars lost by 33 runs

At PTS: Police 182-6 (C Walton 43, Nasir Hameed 38, I Childs 49) beat Tartars 149 (Farooq Saeed 49, Afzaal Haider 34; Mohmd Ozair 10-1-28-3) by 33 runs

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Saracens v. HKU at HKU
Result: Match tied - Saracens won by losing fewer wickets

At HKU: Saracens 267-5 (R Sharma 112, D Chaudhuri 62, R Sujanani 34) beat HKU 267-9 (Butt Hussain 88, B Wilson 39, Khalid Qureshi 44; R Sharma 10-0-73-5) by losing fewer wickets

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Saturday Cup - Round 1: Tuesday, 5th April 2005

Crusaders v. SubCont CC at KCC
Result: Crusaders lost by 3 wkts

Photos

At KCC (played 05.04.05): SubCont 223-7 (T Burgess 71, Chandran 33*; M Cheruparambil 10-0-53-4) beat Crusaders 222-5 (M Cheruparambil 40, D Kelleher 70, T Johnson 34*) by 3 wkts

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Saturday Cup - Round 1: Saturday, 2nd April 2005

Tartars v. Islanders at KCC
Result: Tartars won by 42 runs

At KCC (played 02.04.05): Tartars 128 (T R Kalyaraman 31; Nadeem 8.3-1-23-3, L Singh 6-2-20-4) beat Islanders 86 (A Bhat 9-3-28-6) by 42 runs

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Saracens v. Gap Ramblers at PKVR2
Result: Saracens won by 10 wickets

At PKRV2 (played 02.04.05): Saracens 178-0 (R Sharma 77*, D Chaudhuri 89*) beat Gap Ramblers 174-8 (D Jayasekera 50, M Winstanley 34, A Terlich 30; R Sujanani 10-0-46-4) by 10 wkts

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