Staten Island Open Season With 9 Wicket Win Over Mid Island

Players seen here taking the matting off the field.

Metropolitan Cricket League
After the sunshine which greeted the 6-a-side tournament the previous Sunday, overcast skies welcomed Mid Island Cricket Club to historic Walker Park, home of Staten Island Cricket Club.

After winning the toss, Mid Island CC decided to bat in the first game of the 2014 Metropolitan Cricket League for both sides.  The visitors only had 8 players but started brightly with 14 coming off the first over from Fahad Mughal (5-0-34-1).

This scoring rate was to be arrested by some superb bowling from the southern end from Majid Arab (7-0-25-2) whose figures would have been much better had it not been for 4 dropped catches off his bowling, including a dolly to captain Shaffikul Sackroolar at mid-off from his first delivery.

Opening batsman R. Burrell was the beneficiary of most of these extra lives and he used them to score 33 off just 34 balls, hitting the only boundaries of the innings (two 4s and two 6s) and he was joined in double figures by only the wide tally.  Arab was well supported by Eddie Wright (3-0-9-2) and Ibrahim Zahoor finished off the innings with the fifth ball of his only over.

Zahoor gave Staten Island a breezy start to their innings (22 off 18 balls) but when he was out, mistiming an off-drive, it was left to Habib Rehman (33 off 48 balls) and Majid Arab (11 off 29 balls) who batted cautiously and without chance to guide the home side to an impressive 9-wicket victory in 16 overs.  The one bowler who particularly impressed the spectators was young spinner R Permaul, who bowled very tidily on a small ground.  He bowled the only maiden of the match and finished with figures of 4-1-9-0.

Scorecard online at crichq.com: https://www.crichq.com/#matches/145002