The Yorkton Yorkers finished their first season in the Saskatchewan Cricket League T-20 season on a high note on Saskatchewan Day.
After a dismal performance in a morning match against the Super Kings, Yorkton bounced back in their afternoon match defeating the Cavaliers by five wickets."The Cavaliers are one of the pioneering teams in Saskatchewan cricket, so this gives us a lot of confidence going forward," said Faisal Anwar, Yorkers captain.
Yorkton batted first putting up a total of 148 runs for 5 wickets lost. Despite losing two opening batsmen in just the second over, Harman Grewal steadied the ship, defending his wicket valiantly allowing wicket keeper Ankit Puri to put up his second half-century of the season.
After the fall of Puri's wicket in the 12th over for 52 runs on just 25 balls, Grewal continued to support the strike as Anwar came to the crease. The captain put up 22 runs on 20 balls.
Grewal, who went 13.1 overs was the third top scorer with 19 runs on 31 balls.
With a strong total of 148 runs to defend, Yorkers bowlers made short work of the Cavaliers' opening batsmen taking their wickets in the second and fourth overs respectively.
The Cavs appeared they might make a game of it as a developing partnership between T.J. Singh and A. Gill yielded 50 runs. The big breakthrough for the Yorkers came in the 13th over when leg-spin bowler Mandeep Singh got T.J. Singh to hit a fly ball that was caught by Yorkton fielder Balwant Singh.
With T.J. Singh gone, Yorkton finished off the Cavaliers with wickets in the 15th and 16th overs and two wickets in each of the 17th and 18th overs.
Great performances for the Yorkers included Mandeep Singh and Harman Grewal, who, in addition to scoring 13 and 19 runs respectively, both took three wickets on the bowling side.
Man-of-the-match honours, however, went to Ankit Puri for his four stumpings as wicket keeper and half century in the crease.
Anwar, who took two wickets, attributed the win to cohesiveness.
"We played as a team and performed well in all areas including batting, bowling and fielding, especially no dropped catches," the captain said.
The earlier game could not have gone in a more opposite direction. The Super Kings, who batted first, put up a monster total of 170 runs for seven wickets. Chasing 171, the Yorkers never got the bats scoring just 62 runs. They did, however, manage to nearly complete their innings going all out with only one ball left to play in the last over, which Anwar took as a positive.
The other encouraging thing, he said, was how they rallied back in the field with the Regina team on pace to score 240-plus early in the game.
"The Super Kings scored 84 by seven overs, but we held them to 170," Anwar said. "Unfortunately, our batting broke down again."
With the T-20 season done, the Yorkers turn their attention to the longer format One Day Provincial (ODP) league. With one win and two draws and five games remaining, Yorkton remains in the playoff hunt just four points out of first place.
