By Ernest Ndunda
Former national captains Steve Tikolo, Thomas Odoyo and Jimmy Kamande, playing for Mombasa Jaffery Sports Club B, teamed up to mercilessly destroy Mombasa Heats in one of the Coast Provincial cricket matches.
Mombasa Heats, who were the hosts, fought gallantly but Jaffery were a better side.
Jaffery won the match by a whopping 218 runs.
Having lost the toss and put in to field, Mombasa Heats fielded for 40 overs with Jaffery B amassing 350 runs for the loss of five wickets.
Between the trio Tikolo, Kamande and Odoyo, a total of 220 runs were posted with seven towering sixes in the closing over of the innings by Odoyo.
However, it was a charged younger side that really carried the day for Jaffery B with youngster K Hussein, opening with Tikolo, batting for 16 overs to get a patient 48 against his name and coming later to bowl three wickets with support of Kumail Okera (2/31), Suhail Jiwa (2/16) and Alijawad (1/9).
The youngsters bowled their hearts out with minimal bowling assistance from the senior players.
Murky waters
In another match, Jaffery A found themselves in murky waters at Coast Gymkhana Sports Club against Shree Cutchi Leva.
Batting first, Jaffery A posted a hard-fought 223 with major contribution to the score being Mohamed Fazle with 90 runs.
The rest of the batting line up struggled to score against the Shree all-rounder Paresh Gami (4/51) and Paresh Bhudia (2/49) with some fantastic fielding from Shree.
Chasing the target, Shree lost three quick wickets at 47, but their hopes were revived by the fantastic batting of Paresh Gami (56) and Paresh Bhudia (54) who steered them (Shree) to a two wicket win over the league front runners.
Healthy contribution
At Burhani Ground, Coast Gymkhana A were put in to bat by hosts Simba Union and posted a moderate total of 228 for nine in their allotted overs against some good performance by Mohammed Noman (4/35) and Yusuf Hussein (2/16).
Healthy contributions came from Sanjay Patel (50), Nirav Pandya (41) and Pradeep Patel (42).
In reply, Simba failed to create good partnerships and succumbed to another great bowling and fielding display from Coast Gymkhana to close at 172 for 8 in 40 over.
Nirav Pandya was once again in the heart of the attack with three for 26 as well as Pradeep Patel taking 2 for 28.
Gymkhana A won by 56 runs.
The chase for the top hots up as Mombasa Sports Club lead with a narrow margin with Coast Gymkhana hot on their tail and Jaffery A and Simba Union taking third and fourth positions.
The league continues this Sunday at various sporting venues.
Mombasa Sports Club host Jaffery A, while Coast Gymkhana will be at home to host Burhani Sports Club.
In other matches, Mombasa Heats will be at Jaffery Sports Club to play the latter’s A side. Simba Union square it out with Shree at Burhani Sports Club.
