Dramatic finale to touring season

The touring season came to an end on Sunday with an excellent game of cricket when Marsa took on newcomers Highgate Taverners in a 40-over game.

Highgate elected to bowl first. Nowell Khosla opened the batting for the hosts and went on to collect 66 runs. Ronnie Sacco made 25 and Andy Lenard 18 as Highgate gave away 27 extras in Marsa's total of 182 runs.

For the tourists, J. Mackie took a hat-trick of wickets and J. Smith felled five.

In reply, D. Danos scored 39 runs, P. Starkings 27, P. Thompson 12, C. Hill 15, T. Verney 16 and M. Blunden 18. Then, an exciting partnership towards the end of the innings, from R. Horton (23) and G. Gellingridge (nine), brought the game to a dramatic finale, as the visitors required ten runs to win off the last over.

The first ball went for four runs, next two balls went for singles, the fourth no run and the fifth another single. From the last ball, Highgate needed two runs to draw and three to win. Khosla bowled a slower ball which the batsman missed and only managed a single. That gave the Marsa team a win by one run.

The day before, a three-way Twenty20 tournament was played between Highgate, Quick 1888 (Holland) and Marsa.

The opening game saw Highgate batting first and totalled 125 runs. In reply, the Dutch team could only manage 91 runs.

The second game was between Marsa and Highgate. The locals batted first and totalled 106 runs. Highgate's run chase fell short... their tally stopping at 98 runs.

Marsa played Quick in the remaining match. The Dutch team batted first and totalled 124 runs. In reply, Marsa fell short of their target as they could only manage 114 runs.

All teams finished with the same score, one victory and a defeat.

The previous Wednesday, Marsa played another Twenty20 game against Quick. Marsa totalled a massive 165 runs as Quick just fell short by ten runs.