WCC win opening PT20

Continuing on from their perfect start in the CSPL the previous weekend, Winterthur began their 2019 Swiss Mr Pickwick Twenty20 league (PT20) season with an 8 wicket victory over Zurich Crickets Cricket Club at Deutweg on Saturday 11th May 2019.

This was the WCC’s first Pickwick T20 for the season, against ZCCC.  WCC were eyeing for their 7th consecutive win of a very successful 2019 season 2019, having won all pre-season warm ups and a comfortable win against Swiss united CC the previous weekend. Confidence level of the players was higher than ever, only irritation was the forecasted rain, which distracted the play later on the day on few occasions.

Kasun led the team in absence of official captain Mo. WCC won the toss and elected to bowl first considering the humidity  of the air and the recent form of opening pace pair, Sahan & Elyas. Sahan started the bowling for WCC carrying the same form he is having since the beginning of the season, bowled with pinpoint accuracy and pace. Highlight was the 19th over maiden he bowled, batsmen were not worried about lightning around, but worried to get themselves safely away from his bowling. Elyas, aka the little dynamite, crashed in to batsmen with his swinging ball, ended up sending back both ZCCC openers who had no clue which way the bowl is moving. That in-swinger to in form ZCCC batsman Ruan, which kissed the top of the off stump will be remembered. Deesh and Nirojan bought into attack to handle the middle overs, seemed they both were bit out of touch in the start, brought them back again in later part of the inning and bowled beautifully with their years of experience. Cheema delivered a mature spell in the middle overs to break a 70 runs partnership, which seemed threatening. Fielders showed their energy in the field, Anoop, Nirojan, Bhanuka diving around to cut the singles and two great catching efforts from Suhash and Sahan lift up the determination of whole team. ZCCC set a target of 142 for 7 wickets at the end of their 20 overs, they had to work hard for that against strong WCC bowling unit.

WCC opened their batting with their regular opener Cheema, and Gokul who has shown his batting skills in last few occasions, but beat for pace pace of ZCCC opening bowler this time. It was Cheema’s fire work session once again! He is proving himself for the skill of ball selection to hit and for power hitting, carried his bat through the inning, missed his maiden century for WCC by just 3 runs. After Kasun dismissed cheaply, Bhanuka played an important role protecting one end while enjoying the Cheema show from other end. WCC reached their target just within 14 overs, looked an easy win thanks to accurate bowling and Cheema’s memorable inning.

Hopes among the players strong than ever, it is no more a secret that WCC is the team to beat in 2019 season.