Pothas takes Strikers to victory
Nic Pothas provided the sort of innings that was once a regular feature of his repertoire, but has been missing for the last couple of seasons, to take the Highveld Strikers to a thrilling five-wicket victory with two balls of their 45 overs to spare
Grant Shimmin
10-Jan-2001
Nic Pothas provided the sort of innings that was once a regular feature of
his repertoire, but has been missing for the last couple of seasons, to take
the Highveld Strikers to a thrilling five-wicket victory with two balls of
their 45 overs to spare.
Pothas belted 79 off just 77 balls, the last 26 coming off
just 18 deliveries, to see his side through to their victory target of 226
in 44.4 overs, after they had faced an asking rate of eight to the over in
the latter stages. Forty-eight were needed off the last six, then 31 off the
last four and 18 off the last two. That was when Pothas really came into his
own as Kenny Benjamin's last over went for 14, taking the match away from
the visitors.
It was a bitter pill to swallow for the team from Benoni, just 35km away, as
they suffered their third defeat in six days to see their chances of
reaching the semi-finals diminish even further. Prior to their match against
Boland on January 5, Easterns had been sitting pretty with four wins from
five matches. Now, despite gaining a bonus point in each of those three
matches, they find themselves outside the top four with two difficult
matches, away to Eastern Province and at home to Free State, to come.
In truth, the visitor's defeat was partly of their own making. Having won
the toss and chosen to bat, Easterns got off to a great start as Mike Rindel
and new recruit Andre Seymore put on 120 for the first wicket, before being
separated at the halfway mark of the innings, in the 23rd over, when Seymore
was bowled by Clive Eksteen for 46.
At that point, they were looking good for a total beyond 250, but Rindel ran
himself out just 12 runs later for 60, made off just 63 balls, including 22
off Eksteen's first two overs, and after that, Easterns were never able to
sustain the same scoring rate. It fell below five to the over, only getting
up to that mark again through some good late hitting and running by captain
Deon Jordaan and Aldo van den Berg. That enabled them to reach 225 for
seven, which proved to be just short of what they needed.
For the Strikers, after a woeful season, the victory over a team including
many former Strikers players salvaged some much-needed pride, given that
they can no longer qualify for the semi-finals.