Online Reporter
THE Chevrons opened their T20 tri-series campaign with a five-wicket defeat at the hands of hosts Pakistan in Rawalpindi yesterday.
The Chevrons wasted a good start, after losing the toss and being asked to bat, with their openers Brian Bennett and Tadiwanishe Marumani responding well to the challenge.
Bennett scored 49 and Marumani 30 and the first wicket fell at 72-1. However, the visitors could only manage 147-8 from their 20 overs. Captain Sikanda Raza weighed in with 34 runs.
In response, Pakistan rose on knocks by Fakhar Zaman (44) and Usman Khan (37) to reach 151-5 and win by five wickets, with four balls to spare.
Brad Evans took two wickets and there was a wicket each for Graeme Cremer, Tinotenda Maposa and Richard Ngarava.
Justin Sammons, the Zimbabwe coach, had outlined his team’s objective in this series ahead of the opening match.
“I think, first and foremost, you always want to win. You know, you’re not coming into a game with any other objective except for that.
“So we want to try and play our best cricket and hopefully that produces positive results. But at the end of the day, it’s also about learning.
“You know, it’s about gaining experience in these conditions. A lot of our players haven’t played in conditions like this in terms of the white-ball space, so most certainly also taking as much as we can leading into the World Cup out of it.
“This is pretty much close to the squad we’ll have, obviously excluding Blessing. Bless (Muzarabani) is a big loss for us on this tour. But we’re pretty much settled in terms of what we’re looking at in that sort of space.” — Sports Reporter/Cricbuzz
