Lanna CC were declared winners of the season-opening eights tournament held at Prem David Buck Oval as the three participating teams all won a match apiece but CMLCC had scored most runs over the course of an enjoyable day.
Three teams were involved on the first day of the season as Lanna were joined by Northern Lions and University CC who had done well to field a full team with new and old faces joining Ali, Siva and Cheema. This particularly because this was an Eights tournament with a difference as all three teams had ten players in each match as five pairs batted for two, three or four overs each with five runs lost for each wicket.
The first of the three matches was between UCC and Northern Lions and the young Thais did well to build their total that was finished off strongly by Cher and Ton with 105 scored for seven wickets and a final total of 70.
Abaid and Cheema were clearly the strongest pair for UCC as they made 47 for two in the first four overs and UCC only needed five more runs from the last two pairs to claim victory but both pairs made a negative score. Pit took three wickets in the last over to claim a remarkable victory as UCC made 113 for the loss of 11 wickets to finish on 58.
Lanna took the field against Northern Lions in the second match with two new players in the team in Chris and Jacques who both look very good cricketers but it was friends reunited Jon Scales and Adrian Ballantyne who caught the eye at the top of the innings as Johnny Velvet was out to Lanna’s first ball of the season but the pair managed 20 for 2 and all five pairs made positive contributions as Lanna scored 88 for 7 and a total of 53.
Northern Lions got off to a bad start with minus 11 from the first pair as Chris claimed three wickets without conceding a run and the youngsters managed 71 runs for 6 wickets and a final total of 41 so Lanna had also won by 12 runs.
Lanna batted first against UCC knowing that victory would give them an outright tournament win but narrow defeat would see them declared champions on net run rate. Five pairs batted steadily but again it was the Scales / Ballantyne partnership that took centre stage as Scales hit Abaid for two sixes before Ballantyne was run out as Scales called two. Adrian did play a lovely on-drive for four to almost make up.
Lanna finished on 58 after scoring 83 for 5 but UCC soon got ahead of the rate as Ali and Shahrukh scored 22 without losing a wicket which was matched by Abaid and Adnan as they scored 32 for 2 as Jacques managed to get Abaid caught down the leg-side.
The next two pairs struggled so it was left to Siva and Cheema to bring UCC home to victory as they carefully scored 18 for 1 from the last four overs as UCC made 95 for 6 and a total of 65 runs. UCC had won the match by seven runs but Lanna had the best overall net run rate as all three teams had one win each.
An eights tournament with 10 players per side and all three teams winning a match each was the perfect way to start the season.