Derby Trophy triumph pumps up Cricket Cranes

The spirits in the senior men’s cricket team went up a notch higherafter they came 1-0 down to beat visitors Kenya by three wickets on Tuesday for a 2-1 Series victory at the inaugural Derby Trophy.

Uganda’s coach Laurence Mahatlane, to a great extent, must have been delighted with his team’s achievement at the university oval in Kyambogo, after months of no competitive activity since losing 5-0 to hosts Namibia at the Castle Lite Series in April.

An opening 78-run defeat to Kenya last Saturday still had the Cricket Cranes score some of Mahatlane’s key performance indicators (KPIs) like Riazat Ali’s stand-out half-ton of 74 runs off 72 balls.

And when the South African tactician made changes to test the strength in depth of his unit, Mahatlane was gifted with a nine-wicket win on Monday after left-arm opening seamer Charles Waiswa (4/15 and a maiden in seven overs) had restricted the opposition to 85 runs.

On Tuesday, in pursuit of a target of 226 runs, Ali produced another stellar knock with the bat, hitting a pivotal unbeaten knock of 55 runs off 50 balls which guided the team home.

“It was grateful for a Series win,” Cranes’ captain Brian Masaba said amid the team’s celebrations. “It was very entertaining. We did well to restrict them to that score,” he said of the bowlers led by Dinesh Nakrani who picked 4/40.

Kenya had relied on opener Rushabhvardhan Patel (34 off 45), Nelson Odhiambo (40 off 64) and Emmanuel Ringera (47* off 63) for a rather respectable total.

With the bat, Nakrani and his friends Saud Islam and Ronak Patel were all muted to single digits but left-hand opener Simon Ssesaazi (37 off 34) remained calm before he got support from Kenneth Waiswa (46 off 74).

It is Ali who bridged that and kept the momentum with five boundaries and two maximums and a late 70-run stand for the seventh wicket with Fred Achelam (34-run-a-ball) delivered the trophy.

“We didn’t start well, chasing under the pump. Ssesaazi did well, helped by Waiswa. Riazat took on the responsibility well to take it home, an overall great team effort,” added Masaba.

The Cricket Cranes will hope to keep the same momentum heading into the Pearl of Africa Twenty20 Tri-Series involving Nigeria which begin tomorrow as they fine-tune preparations for next month’s ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Sub-Regional Africa Qualifiers in Rwanda’s capital Kigali.

“We focus on the T20 because they hold an international status. We’ll take a day to refocus, we definitely want to win. It’s all cricket, the basics remain the same,” Masaba added.

Uganda will compete against Kenya and Nigeria, which recently had eight of its players compete against the Uganda U19s under the Kaduna State franchise.

ICC DERBY TROPHY - RESULTS
Kenya 225/7 
Uganda 229/7 (44.2 Overs)
Uganda won by 3 wickets
Kenya 85/10 (29 overs) 
Uganda 87/1 (12.1 overs)
Uganda won by 9 wickets
Kenya 306/7 
Uganda 228/10 (46.2 overs)
Kenya won by 78 runs
KADUNA STATE TOUR OF UGANDA
Uganda U19s 140/10 
(41.3 overs) Kaduna State 134/6 [130]
Kaduna State won by 4 wickets (D/L)
Kaduna State 170/8 
Uganda U19s 188/9 [193]
Kaduna State won by 4 runs [D/L]

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