On Saturday, the Safi Barracks ground hosted the first cricket game in over eight years.

The portable pitch did not play as true as the Marsa pitch as batsmen were surprised at regular intervals. A Krishna team took on a Melita selection in a twenty over game.

The Krishna team batted first with Tony Azzopardi opening the batting with Darren Grech. Azzopardi was first to go being caught behind by John Grima for one run.

Next in, Mike Caruana was also next out, top scoring for his team with 23 runs. Nowell Khosla hit the first six of the day and two balls later was the first batsman to be surprised by the pitch and was clean bowled. He had made 11 runs.

Grech was eventually stumped and played a good innings of 20 runs. Sam Aquilina made 17 runs not out, also playing a good innings and Tony Slater played a good innings of 18 runs being run out on the last ball of the innings. Aided by 20 wides and one no ball, the Krishna team totalled a score of 111 runs. For Melita, Dave Newton, Richard Rogers,Malcoln Crabbe and Andy Lenard all took a wicket each.

In reply, the Melita were off to a very slow start and had lost five wickets for 20 runs. Malcolm Crabbe scored one and was bowled with one of the pitch surprises.

Richard Rogers was brilliantly caught and bowled by Will Nicholls for four runs. Dave Newton scored seven runs off three balls before being run out, Rajesh was LBW for four runs and John Rusher was bowled for three runs.

A steady partnership was building between John Grima and Andy Lenard when the latter, after hitting a towering six, was also caught with a magnificent catch by Aquilina for 10 runs.

Pierre Naudi did not bother the scorers too much being the first duck for the day. Grima played an excellent innings being the last man out scoring the first 50.

It still was not enough. The Melita team only scored 90 runs. For Krishna Tony Azzopardi was the main wicket taker with two.

Next Saturday will see the return game starting at noon. The academy/nursery will be held at the Marsa ground from 9.00 a.m. till 10.30 a.m., also on Saturday.