Barras knock off Kenya with help

 THE Papua New Guinea Barramundis recorded their first win in their opening warm up match as part of the ICC World T20 Qualifier at Bready Cricket Ground in Ireland by defeating Kenya by 10 runs on the Duckworth/Lewis system. 

Coach Dipak Patel, pictured, was happy with his player’s performance especially with the bowlers, to pull the game back and restricted the Kenyan batsmen. 

 “We bowled well in the middle part and build a lot of pressure by restricting boundary balls and forced Kenyan batsmen to make mistakes and loss wickets regularly. 

“We could have restricted them to a modest score but we let them get away a bit when we had the chance to close their inning off. Spin bowlers lead the way with Assad Vala, Mahuru Dai and Charles Amini bowling smart spells to force errors with the Kenyan batsmen,” Patel said. 

Kenya scored a healthy 141 runs in their 20 overs but PNG’s batsmen came out with guns blazing and scored 2/45 runs in the first five overs before the match was stopped due to rain. 

On the Duckworth Lewis system PNG required to score 35 runs in 5 overs as they lost two wickets but at (2/45) at the 5th over mark meant PNG were ahead by 10 runs on the DL system and were awarded the winners.  

The players rested for this match were Willie Gavera, Chad Soper, Pipi Raho and Sese Bau. 

 PNG play their first match of the ICC World T20 Qualifier on Sunday against Jersey and Hong Kong on Monday.  

The top six sides from the 14 team ICC World T20 Qualifier competition will join the 10 full members for the ICC World Twenty20 India 2016, which will be held from March 11 to April 3, 2016.

Fixtures: Sun, July 12 –PNG v Jersey; Mon, July 13 –Hong Kong v PNG; Wed, July 15 – Ireland v PNG; Fri, July 17 – Nepal v PNG; Sat, July 18 – PNG v Namibia; Sun, July 19 –PNG v USA. Qualifying playoffs/finals: July 21-26.