Canada Upset Marooners After Nitish Kumar Ton

BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – Set up by a run-a-ball hundred from Nitish Kumar and formalised by steady bowling, Canada stunned champions Combined Campuses & Colleges Marooners to clinch their first win in the Colonial Medical Insurance Super50 Cup on Thursday.

Chasing 250 for victory, the Marooners were undone by the pace and spin combination of Kaleem Sana-ur-Rehman and Kanwar Mann, who shared six wickets between them to send the Marooners sliding to their third defeat in the tournament.

Left-arm pacer Kaleem grabbed 3-37 from 8.1 overs and Mann snared 3-38 from nine overs, as the Marooners bid to put up a stern defence of their title hit a snag, when they were bowled out for 149 in 35.1 overs in their Group A contest at the Conaree Cricket Centre.

Jonathan Drakes gathered the top score of 40 and Akeem Jordan, batting at eight, showed late defiance to collect 37, but the rest of the Marooners batting failed to ignite; no other batsman able to reach 20.

Earlier, Kumar cracked 14 boundaries in 102 from 102 balls – his third List A hundred – to lead the Canadian batting and propel them to 249 in 49.1 overs, after they decided to bat.

He shared two significant stands that propped up the Canada batting on another placid pitch, putting on 80 for the second wicket with Jeet Metha and 103 for the third wicket with Shahid Ahmadzai.

Ahmadzai supported with 73 from 87 balls that included five fours and four fours, and Metha made 34 before the Canadians crumbled inside the last 10 overs, losing their last eight wickets for 62.

Jordan, one of last season’s leading bowlers, was the pick of the Marooners attack, taking 5-33 from nine overs, his second List A five-wicket haul, and his captain Carlos Brathwaite, the immediate past West Indies Twenty20 International captain, ended with 4-40 from 9.1 overs.