Mid West Rhinos win

best match figures of 10/76 after Rocks capitulated at 157 runs, with one day remaining. However, the heavy defeat dwarfed a fine debut for 18-year old Zimbabwe youth international Cuthbert Musoko who took 4-63 on his debut in Rocks’ colours. 
While Rhinos were winning comfortably at home, Eagles were battling to keep their chances alive against Mountaineers yesterday after the Harare side suffered a top order collapse in their second innings.
The game appeared evenly balanced yesterday when Mountaineers took a 34-run first innings lead in response to Eagles’ 343. But Mountaineers appeared to gain ground, restricting their opponents to 270 runs with Natsai Mushangwe (4/98) and Tendai Chatara (3/57) shining.
They were responding to the hosts’ paltry first innings total of 149.
And with 250 runs needed to win inside two days, Rocks resumed their second innings on 34/2 yesterday and found themselves in big trouble by lunch hour as heavy odds were already staked against them after losing seven wickets with 129 runs on the board.
Former Zimbabwe international Edward Rainsford then wrapped up the game when he ran through the bottom order to finish with five match wickets.
It was a disappointing end to a game as Rocks had come into the match bubbling with confidence after claiming their first ever Logan Cup win in the modern franchise system when they beat Mashonaland Eagles last week.
While Rhinos were winning comfortably at home, Eagles were battling to keep their chances alive against Mountaineers yesterday after the Harare side suffered a top order collapse in their second innings.
The game appeared evenly balanced yesterday when Mountaineers took a 34-run first innings lead in response to Eagles’ 343.
But Mountaineers appeared to gain ground as they restricted their opponents to 270 runs with Natsai Mushangwe (4/98) and Tendai Chatara (3/57) doing most of the damage.
Eagles’ top four batsmen all went out for single digit scores as Sikandar Raza (49) and Regis Chakabva (49) came in with decent contributions to push the scores to respectable margins after the visitors had slumped to 15/4 early in the sixth over.
Tail-ender Tino Mutombodzi (100) then scored maiden first class century to give Mountaineers something to chase when they resume this morning.
The Mountain goats had lost three quick wickets at stumps.
They have the whole day to chase 200 runs to win the game with seven wickets in hand.