Over the weekend, English side Linklaters made their debut at the Marsa oval in a two-game series against the local team.

On Saturday, Marsa totalled 146 runs in a 30-over game. They were heavily aided by 43 points from extras, 37 of which were wides as Linklaters must have found it difficult to settle at new environs.

John Grima opened the Marsa innings and collected 39 runs which included five boundaries.

Frank Spiteri was also making his presence felt with 20 runs before he was caught. Mark G. Sacco, who has been in good form of late, made 18 runs.

For the visitors, Dimitri Fomink took three wickets and T. Whittle two.

Linklaters may have been let down by the bowling but their batting was something different as they made easy work of the run chase, hitting the runs required in the 19th over.

The assault was led by A. Patel who retired after making 60 runs which included nine fours.

T. Raper had 24, A. Ahmed 29 and J. Zipfinger 12.

There were 23 extras from the home side, all wides, as Linklaters took a one-nil lead in the series.

Sunday’s match was shortened to a 20-over due to a late start.

This time the visitors batted first but Marsa bowled extremely well.

Andrew Naudi and Haroon Majeed took two wickets each to put Linklaters on the back foot.

Dhokia’s effort

Whittle tried to steady the ship with a patient 45 as L.Wood chipped in with 20 runs. N. Dhokia was not to be outdone, batting at no.11, and smashed his way to a 27 which in-cluded two sixes and two fours.

Their final score was 130 runs.

Young Suhrid Roy picked three wickets while Bikram Arora and Haroon Majeed took a wicket each.

With the batting line-up they had, the hosts must have felt confident of reaching the required target.

Five batsmen (Joy Ghoseroy 13, Haroon Majeed 10, Arora 12, Suhbas Roy 28 not out and Mike Caruana 26 not out) all had starts but did not get the job done and this time there was only 15 extras.

E. Llewelyn took three wickets for Linklaters who whitewashed Marsa 2-0 in the series.

Another new team, Pontefract New College, will be playing Marsa CC next.