Malaysia cruise to eight-wicket victory over Fiji

Malaysia cruised its way to a eight-wicket victory over Fiji today at Pepsi ICC World Cricket League Division 6 (WCL Div. 6) at Kinrara Oval in Kuala Lumpur. The hosts side never looked truly troubled by the men from the South Pacific and finished proceedings with 15 overs to spare.

Meanwhile, Guernsey beat Kuwait at Bayeumas Oval to continue its winning ways while Selangor Turf Club saw heavy rains today and forced Jersey's match against Nigeria to be abandoned after 44 overs with the men in red having scored 218 runs before the downpours ruined the day's play.

At Kinrara, Malaysia won the toss and Suhan Alagaratanam made what proved to be the right decision by fielding first against Joe Rika's men from Fiji. The day proved to once again belong to Eszrafiq Azis, who alongside Hammad Ullah Khan, set about cleaning up the Fijian top order with some ease.

Hammad took first honours with the ball, dismissing captain Rika after 10 overs and medium-pacer Eszrafiq made sure none of Fiji's middle order made more than 13 runs as Malaysia's superior fielding skills saw the side limit Fiji to just 129 all out in less than 50 overs, Eszrafiq claiming five wickets in the process.

After lunch, Malaysia made light work of the total, taking just 35 overs to make the target and losing just Rakesh Madhavan and Ahmad Faiz to the bowling of Mohammed Khan of Fiji.

Opening batsman Shafiq Sharif stuck out the innings to finish 55 not out accompanied by Suhan who completed the day with 54 runs to his name, both were contenders for Man of the Match, however Eszrafiq walked away with the honours once again.

Malaysia captain Suhan said: "I think today we played a really good all-round game. We were on the mark with our bowling and fielding in the first innings and credit should really go to Eszrafiq again who performed really well for us.

"In the batting department the top order contributed and it feels good to have won by a big margin to improve our run-rate even further in the points table. It's by no means a done deal for us, we need to keep winning every game to secure ourselves promotion."

Fiji's Joe Rika was obviously disappointed to have lost out to Malaysia and paid compliment to Eszrafiq's strong bowling performance. "It was another disappointing performance by us with the bat and our batsmen have failed to live up to our expectations. We'll have to improve a lot if we want to win our last two matches.

"Eszrafiq bowled a really strict line which definitely restricted us from scoring runs and he created a lot of pressure and we never seemed to get on the front foot and struggled to contain him."

At Bayeumas, Jeremy Frith continued his fine form for Guernsey scoring 82 to help the Channel Island to its total of 212 against WCL Div. 7 and 8 winners Kuwait. Apart from Frith, Lee Savident contributed 29 runs but the middle order didn't contribute as much as it has in the past for the Guernsey side.

Sibtain Raza proved to be the pick of the Kuwaiti bowlers, claiming four wickets including that of Savident and top order batsman Tim Ravenscroft while Saad Khalid once again showed his worth with three scalps to his name.

In reply, it looked like plain sailing for the strong Kuwaiti batting line-up, Irfan Bhatti opening for the Kuwaitis and contributing 66 to the score before departing to the bowling of GH Smit.

The innings however belonged to James Nussbaumer whose fine bowling saw the 24-year-old fast bowler claim five wickets for just 35 runs. A lower order batting collapse saw the opposition fail to reach the required target, needing just 15 runs, with two overs to go and two wickets in hand, Guernsey had other ideas as Nussbaumer and Stuart Le Prevost ran-out the last two men in the Kuwait side.

The right-armed Nussbaumer dismissed both Azmatullah Nazeer and Mohammed Amin in a matter of a few overs before running-out Saad Khalid to have the side flailing at 199-9 and with that all was lost as Le Prevost ran out Abdullah Akhunzada and sealed another victory for the in-form side.

Man of the match Nussbaumer said: "I bowled with intent because we knew the guys top of the order batted well and we had to restrict them when it came to scoring runs. I think things worked particularly well for me today when it came down to the Power Plays and I made sure I bowled my Yorkers and made it hard for them and it paid off.

"In regards to chasing down our total, they batted sensibly taking their time and I think they had 115 up off 20 overs or so and with eight or nine wickets in hand they thought they had the game in easy reach. They were slow to start but credit has to be given to them they were in control until we managed to start taking wickets regularly.

"Their spinners definitely bowled well today against our batting line-up and tired us out a bit before we reached our total of 212, which I think was a competitive score but we should have got more in hindsight. I think they made it hard for us out there today and when we had them seven or eight down and we managed to run their last couple of guys out you had the feeling they were just going for the runs with all they had left in them."

It was an unfortunate day for Jersey and Nigeria, with 44 overs of the game completed at Selangor, the heavens opened and heavy downpours forced the match to be abandoned. Peter Gough's side was on its way to making a good total when the rain arrived, the side were 218-6 with Dean Morrison, Ben Stevens and Sam de la Haye all contributing. Endurance Ofem was working hard with this side and the bowlers were pushing through the Jersey batting line up before the bad weather rolled in.

The match may be replayed on 22 September (Thursday) dependent on the completion of tomorrow's round of fixtures.

Tomorrow's fixtures (Round Four) are as follows: Fiji v Kuwait (Kinrara), Nigeria v Guernsey (Selangor) and Malaysia v Jersey (Bayeumas)

Scores in brief after Day 3

At Kinrara

Fiji 129 all out, 44.4 overs (C Rika 27; Eszrafiq 5-36)

Malaysia 133-2, 35.3 overs (Shafiq 55 not out, Suhan 54 not out)

Malaysia won by eight wickets

At Selangor

Jersey 218-6, 44 overs (Morrison 46, Stevens 48, De la Haye 43 not out; Ofem 2-30)

Nigeria

Match abandoned due to rain

At Bayeumas

Guernsey 212 all out, 49.2 overs (Frith 82; Sibtain 4-35, Saad Khalid 3-36)

Kuwait 200 all out, 48.4 overs (Bhatti 66, Hisham 30; Nussbaumer 5-35)

Guernsey won by 13

Points Table as of 20 September

Pepsi ICC WCL Division 6 Points Table