Israel under-18 player Avial Varsulkar was the hero for the Modi’in Young Lions as they beat the Pommeranz Juice Good Old Boys by 30 runs in the Night League.
Batting first, PJGOB’s found the going tough against some accurate bowling as Varsulkar and 12-year-old Yair Nagavkar helped themselves to nine wickets between them. For PJGOB, only James Franks and Jeremy Bentley (28) and Danny Verbov and Aryeh Rachlin (25) made significant partnerships in a team total of 49.
MYL were never in any trouble chasing the below par total and cruised to 78 to register their first win of the season. Varsulkar finished with five wickets and a top score of 31.
Gold Insurance Bet Shemesh Lightning were next up for PJGOB in the double-header night and this was a much closer contest which PJGOB won by 18 runs.
Some tight bowling by GIBSL in the first eight overs restricted PJGOB to 21, but then Verbov and Rachlin, followed by Charlton Book and PJ Sahor cut lose to ass 76 in the last eight overs as they reached a very good total of 97.
Although GIBSL put up a brave fight, they were always slightly behind the asking run rate Yitzchak Treister and Jeff Tibber were GIBSL top scorers with 26 out of a total of 80.
PJGOB captain, Davi Pushett said: "It's been a mixed start to the season. We had trouble with MYL's good bowling and tight fielding, but thankfully good partnerships for the third and fourth batting pairs provided a modest total of 49 that was always going to be hard to defend."
But he was update about his teams second match, saying: "I thought the score of 97 was far more defendable and our tight bowling and fielding meant that we walked away happy with our first win of the season."
PJGOB captain, Alan 'Wiggi' Wigman responded: "It was a game we felt we should have won, but full credit to Pomeranz for holding on to claim the victory.
Ra’anana Raiders Cricket Club made their debut into the league with an emphatic win over the Bet Shemesh Royals.
Winning the toss, RRCC captain, Gabi Schachat elected to bat and a solid 22 opening stand between Micha Schachat and Rafi Davidson followed by partnerships of 41 between Ziv Gould and Daniel Bergman and 27 between captain Schachat and Gidi Hilkowitz enabled the RRCC to reach 113.
Apart from the extras the Royals gave away, this was a much improved Royals produced a very disciplined display with Ari Lewis picking up three wickets and Gadi Barnett and Chovav Wigman sharing four wickets apiece.
The Royals started off well with the Lewis brothers, Alex and Ari scoring 19. It would have been more but for a wonderful piece of fielding by Rafi Davidson as he ran out Ari with a direct hit. Eli Heilbrun, Hilkowitz and Gould claimed two wickets apiece as BSR were restricted to 69, despite a late batting cameo from Eli Shaw and Gadi Barnett which produced 22 runs.
BSR stand-in captains Eli Shaw and Alex Lewis thought it was "a good effort, with everyone getting behind each other and giving the opposition a good game".
The next round of fixtures will see Yefeth Nagavkar’s ever improving Modi’in Young Lions up against the YMCB who will be expecting to produce a better result than their opening day loss against the YMCA’s. The Kiddush Club Jerusalem will be next up for the YMCB’s and on current form, the KCJ should be comfortable winners.
It will not be all plain sailing for the KCJ as on Saturday evening they play their fierce rivals, the Pearl Dental Cricket Club in what is expected to be a very tense affair.
The KCJ team comprise of a number of ex-Pearl Dental players and this game has the makings of an exceptionally close contest.
To get more from Life, click here to sign up for our free Life newsletter.