With both teams keen to get started, Gold B put YMCB into bat. The first pair of Robbie Krombein and Adam Finkelstein started strong with a partnership of 41.
This above par total proved to be very useful, as the next pair were unable to maintain the scoring rate. Former captain and team organiser Warren Weinburg struggled to score against a crafty offside-dominated field, the brain-child of Gold captain Ilan Perez.
Warren chose to hit his own wicket so as to ensure that he didn’t need to face the entire over. The wicket maiden was a sign of things to come, as a couple of wickets later meant that only five further runs were added to the total by the halfway mark.
The third pair was able to put the Bs back on track, scoring 25 runs for the loss of only one wicket, including the power-play overs. Coming to the crease with the score on 71, the final pair, consisting of Simon Levy and Ian Glass added a further 44 runs to the total, aided at times by some slightly wayward bowling, with the Gold B team finishing on 115 runs.
Despite Gold B believing that the total was on the low side, YMCB came out confident that they were in the box-seat and so it proved. Some great bowling and average fielding, which failied to convert more than one of the chances offered by the batsmen, meant that Gold B were only able to score 13 at the halfway stage.
With the dangerous pair of Ilan and Leon Joseph due in next, a quick team huddle was necessary to ensure that the team stayed focus, and four wickets during the partnership, courtesy of a superb catch at midwicket from Adam, some tossed up slow bowling from Warren Lewis and a clever slower ball from the captain which was edged behind, resulted in only a further 12 runs being added to the total.
Whilst the win had been ensured by this point, cotntinued tight bowling and fielding at the end ensured that a double bonus point was added to the points tally, and that the final margin of victory was 70 runs.
In the rounds other match, Division One league leaders MYL made it seven from seven by crushing 2017 runners-up YMCA 141-59.
Israel's U18 Maccabiah bronze medal winner Yair Nagavkar smashed a remarkable 48 off 19 balls to win the Richards Ableson man of the match award.
This week in Division Two, Israel Academy will be looking to secure their first win of the season up against YMCC, while Redwood hope to inflict a first defeat for league leaders MYL, while rejuvenated YMCA and GOLD 'A' come up against PDCC and Modshem S'Sixers.
Report by Simon Levy
