Budo Oval
Avengers CC 242/10 Alpha Adowa 116(123), Asim Ahmed 27(58) in 50 Overs beat Budo CC 229/10 Joel Siminyu 64(109), Taha Ahmed 29(35) in 47 Overs by 13 runs
Toss won by Budo who opted to field
Man of match: Alpha Adowa 116(123)
Jinja Oval
Africa CC 181/10 Kasujja Quraish 41(38), Richard Lwamafa 26(38) in 46.5 overs lost to Patidar CC184/6 Innocent Mwebaza 41(62) n.o, Hardik Patel 34(41) in 41.2 overs by 4 wickets
Toss won by Africa who opted to bat
Man of match: Innocent Mwebaza 41(38), 3/38 in 7.5 overs
Budo and Avengers let ball fall off the willow in a game that had 471 runs scored between both sides. On the small Budo pitch and with ball coming to bat Avengers' Alpha Adowa stood out with a century against his former side.
Budo won the toss and chose to field a decision that was backed by young quick bowler Joel Alinda who bouced out three Avengers' batsmen leaving Avengers railing at 30/3. However, new signing Alpha Adowa in just his second game for Avengers dropped anchor taking body blows but most importantly choosing his scoring shots carefully. Even though wickets fell around him, he carried the bulk of scoring runs eventually bringing up his century in the 46th over of the game. His 116 helped his side post a competitive 242 all out but if Budo had not been generous in the field, the score would have been less.
Budo were tentative in the chase and despite losing opener Emmanuel Kamya to the first ball of the innings, Joel Simiyu and Deepesh embarked on a rebuilding job trying to see off Avenger's strike bowlers. Avenger's took a ,risk by bowling out their best bowlers and this gave Budo's power game a chance as the young men expressed themselves scoring boundaries for fan in the middle overs. They quickly moved the scores from 50 runs inside 20 overs to needing only 40 in the five overs but with only 3 wickets in hand.
It came down to 18 runs needed in the final three overs and with only one wicket in hand, Wilfred Ogwang and Joel Alinda looked like they would nick it Budo until the latter glanced a juicy leg side delivery to Emmanuel Waigo who was perfectly placed at short fine leg. The tall lanky fast bowler held on to break Budo hearts and send the worried Avengers bench into celebrations.
The narrow win for Avengers is their third of the season and despite the loss for Budo they can take the good lessons from the loss.
In Jinja ACC were shocked by an improved Patidar in a game the former were favorites. ACC failed to defend 181 with Innocent Mwebaze put in a man of match all round performance as his Patidar side completed a 4 wicket win. ACC favorites for promotion to Div 1 this season started the season like a house on fire with two very convincing wins but losses to Budo and Patidar have stopped their ascendence to the top.
The win for Patidar leaves the Div 2 table very wide open, only Nile seems to be out of the race for promotion but all the other seven teams still have a chance for promotion and the top two sides might be decided on the final day of the season just like the 2017 season.