Nucaf Tellicherry win Piri Piri T20 League

UAE national player Arshad Ali failed with the bat but grabbed four wickets to help Nucaf Tellicherry win the Piri Piri T20 Turf Cricket League at The sevens cricket grounds on Monday.

They beat Wings XI by 29 runs in the final in a thrilling climax to a two-month long winter season competition held under the auspices of Dubai Cricket Council, conducted by British expat Aneel Sabir and sponsored by Piri Piri Cricket Bats (UK) & Wings Group (Dubai).

The final under floodlights began after an hour delay due to techincal issues with one of the lights.

Nucaf made up for the disappointment by scoring a mammoth 184 for four in their 20 overs.

Ali started well but was amazingly run-out by a direct hit from Farmanullah and after five overs the score was restricted to 46. Prashant Braggs then produced an awesome batting display remaining unbeaten on 82 with five sixes and seven fours.

Wings X1 captain Fazil and Farmanullah bowled tight, restricting the Nucaf batsmen to only 44 runs in their collective eight overs. Ashraf was the only other bowler from Wings X1 to strike with two wickets in his 3 overs.

When they began their chase, Wings XI lost Rafeek in the second ball of the innings bowled by Devendra. This brought about the pairing of Nasir and Shamil who batted built a solid 80-run partnership before Shamil was dismissed by the Nucaf captain Mashood CTK.

"It's amazing. We have played some excellent cricket in this league and it was organised very well. Congrats to all my team members but the overall winner in this league was the game of cricket. We hope to be back in it next season," said Mashood an ex-Ranji Trophy player.

Nasir bravely continued his onslaught but unfortunately none of the other WIngs X1 batsmen stood the test of time at the crease and wickets fell frequently.

Ali struck at regular intervals to ended with superb figures of four for 23 in his four overs.

Wings X1 fought very hard and actually hung the game in balance all the way until the 13th over but eventually could not stop the rampant Nucaf from triumphing.

The build up to the finals was extremely exciting as Aneel had introduced a UK-style league concept to cricket on Dubai with various bonus batting and bowling points on offer and the team with the most points qualified in their division.

There were three divisions in total consisting of five teams each which also included Yogi Group, Interface Transworld, Carfare CC, Crayford Hawks, HSBC, Standard Chartered Bank, Loose Cannons, Dubai Rangers, BTB Veterans, Serco Middle East, Asia X1, National Bank of Fujairah and D United.

Teams battled it out for points for winning and bonus points, even if teams lost games and the race to the 'finish line' was very tight with final games deciding who was to progress to the semifinals.

HSBC and Asia X1 fought hard in the semifinals to oust Nucaf Tellicherry and Wings X1 from the high-profile competition but the might of the latter proved too much.
 

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