Hoods claim 9th crown

Normal, Sports

COUSINS Raturima Maha and Billy Maha took the Niugini Oil attack apart as they completely took control to steer Pagini Hoods to their 9th premiership against Niugini Oil in the Lae Cricket grand final. 
Both batsmen refused to accept the bad light conditions offered by the umpires at 5.45pm as they sensed victory if they continued the momentum. 
In what is probably the best run chase seen in Lae cricket, both youngsters took up the challenge after Hoods had lost three wickets, Adrian Raka (13), Ben Kasper (8) and Jason Yama (2), at just 3/46.
The feature of their innings was their ability to convert short singles into twos and hitting boundaries from both ends.
Both applied immense pressure on the fielding side taking short sharp singles, sometimes converting them into two runs.
Both piled 82 runs in the space of eight overs that outdid any hope of a Niugini Oil victory.
When Raturima (48) was caught, this placed Hoods at 5/133, with just five runs needed for victory with six batsmen in hand and five overs to spare.
Billy Maha (39) followed soon after, but skipper Richard Basada and all-rounder Rodney Maha steered Hoods safely through under fading lights.
Skipper Roge Ravusiro (2/11) when introduced, slowed down the run flow, however, once he bowled his quota of overs, things turned into turbo motion for both Mahas.
Keimelo Vuivagi provided good support with (2/18) while Boe Leke (1/27) got the other wicket.
Earlier, Niugini Oil posted a challenging total of 132 from their mandatory 20 overs with Vivian Kila topscoring with 47 runs while opener Laka Ezekiel made a fine 25.
Morea Tau (11) and extras (23) made up the bulk of Niugini Oil’s total.
Basada (2/11), Rodney Maha (2/22), Opi Ravu (1/14), Kolit Kairi (1/20) Soma Kairi (1/34) and Billy Maha (1/25) shared the bowling honours.
Raturima Maha was named “man of the match” taking his second successive award after winning last season’s award as well.
In the earlier grand final, the Pagini Hoods (10/73) defeated Porporena (8/50) after the mandatory 15 overs to claim  premiership in the women’s division.