Central Zone U-13s win Shell cricket again

CENTRAL Zone completed a beaver-trick of victories when they defeated East by 63 runs on Thursday in the final of the Shell sponsored Under-13 cricket championship at the National Cricket Centre ground in Balmain, Couva.

Winning the toss and taking first strike, defending champions Central recovered well from a precarious position of 106 for six wickets to finish on 177 all out in 33.3 overs and then bundled out East for 117 in 27 overs.

Earlier, heavy rain just before the 10.30 am start had put the final in jeopardy but the weather quickly improved to allow the match to take place, but was reduced to 35 overs from the scheduled 50 overs.

Man-of-the-Match Thomas Walsh took four wickets for 12 runs in six overs, mopping up the East Zone tail in the run chase as they slumped from 101 for five wickets to 114 all out.

Lending valuable support was Emilio Vilafana who grabbed two wickets for eight runs, while Luke Ali finished with two for 17 in five overs to end any hope East Zone had.

Top scorer for East was Andre Suglal who made 36 with seven boundaries, and opener Abdul Topping contributed 20 with four hits to the ropes.

The foundation of the Central Zone victory was laid by the solid batting of their captain Justin Jagessar who received he award for the highest individual score of 40 with four boundaries and two maximums.

Dillon Balkaran struck five fours in making 36. Middle-order batsman Mathias Bruzal also compiled a useful 24 in the team’s total.

At one stage, Central were in danger of being dismissed well below their eventual score and were 109 for six but composed batting by Bruzal and an outstanding last wicket partnership of 31 between Luke Ali and Emilio Vilafana took the total from 146 for nine to 177 all out.

East Zone employed the services of eight bowlers to put the brakes on the Central batsmen but were undone by the last wicket pair with Rayaz Gopaul, Yasir Deen, Andrew Rambaran and Rajeev Ramgoolie picking up one scalp each.

Deen of Central Zone was adjudged the best fielder, who apart from taking a wicket, effected a run out and took a catch.

At the presentation ceremony afterwards, Dudnath Ramkessoon, Cricket Operations Officer of the TT Cricket Board thanked Shell Trinidad Limited for their unstinting support of the inter zone competition for more than a decade and a half.

He said without Shell’s involvement, the inter zone development programme would not have been possible.