Kanbis dismiss Sikh Union to win NPCA T20 trophy

By GILBERT KOECH

Rakep Patel bats against Sri Lanka in past action.

Kanbis Sports Club won the Nairobi Province Cricket Association (NPCA) Twenty20 title   beating Sikh Union by 40 runs in the finals played at the Nairobi Gymkhana club over the weekend.

The champions won the toss and elected to bat and quickly made a good account of themselves, putting up 63 runs for two before ending on 137 for eight in the closing minutes.

Sikh Union had a slow start losing seven wickets for 27 runs before ending on a paltry 97 runs with 11 balls to play. Rakep Patel said despite the poor batting, he was confident his team would recover to post better results in future.

“It was tough chasing the overall target and the final have got an account of being low scoring affair. Nevertheless, we’ve a good bowling side with several experienced players though we erred at some point.”

Patel made 27 runs off 34 balls and later went on to pick two wickets for 19 to steer his side to victory against a side that put on a poor show with the bat.

Patel put up a second wicket stand of 52 in partnership with Dhiren Gondaria that got the scores to 63 before he was sent to the pavillion by Nadeem Ahmed.

Gondaria made 22 runs off 29 balls before he was caught off by Raj Shikotra.

Vinod Rabadia (27) and Ramesh Mepani (20) were the other key contributors with the bat for Kanbis.

Nadeem  Ahmed and Tarandeep Singh were the top wicket takers with two for 34 and two for 29 respectively.

Sikh lost their first two wickets for 14 runs. Gurdeep Singh was the first to be dismissed for four before Ahmed followed him with a ball later on six runs.

Collins Obuya was anticipated to create some gap in the inning but more wicket continued to fall and his side static on 59 runs for five. Obuya had to risk and lost his wicket for 28 runs but was caught mid off by Gondaria off Rajesh Bhudia after facing 31 balls.

Rajesh Varsani, Narendra Patel and Bhudia all bagged two wickets each. 

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