The Danube Lions retained the Ramadan Indoor Cricket Tournament title with an outstanding display in the Grand Final against DBMSC Steel at the ICC Academy at Dubai Sports City.
Danube’s victory margin was 32 runs and, in truth, it was a match the defending champion had in the bag from early on thanks to a superb effort with the ball and in the field.
The victory ensured Danube went through the entire tournament unbeaten – a total of 10 matches – and the side collected the winning prize of AED7000 from ICC Academy Head Coach Mudassar Nazar, the former Pakistan all-rounder.
For DBMSC Steel it was a case of what might have been.
The steel men had run Danube close in the Super Six stage of the competition, losing by just one run, but the ruthlessness of Danube on Grand Final night meant there was never a possibility of a repeat of that thrilling contest.
It left DBMSC with the consolation of the runner-up prize of Dhs2,000 and the knowledge that its players had lost out to a worthy champion.
Danube restricted its opponents to such an extent that at the halfway stage of the first innings of the match, DBMSC had a total of minus two runs.
In the face of that sort of start, it was always going to be a massive uphill task for DBMSC to recover and post a defendable score and although its later batsmen did rally, a final total of 13 was way short of a mark that was likely to test Danube.
Sure enough, the Lions eased to victory, totaling 45, with a final flourish from Mendis and Isuru yielding 20 runs in the last three overs of the match.
All Danube’s players were at the top of their game on the night and each of the eight men on duty took at least one wicket with the ball, but the player of the match award went to Kamal, who took two wickets at a miserly cost of minus one run.
Kamal was also player of the tournament for his outstanding all-round contribution to his side’s success, with runs, wickets and high-quality fielding.
