Mashonaland, the favourites, held an advantage at the end of thefirst of three days’ play in the Logan Cup final againstManicaland, although they should have done better and would havedone much worse had the opposition held their catches

John Ward07-Apr-2000Mashonaland, the favourites, held an advantage at the end of thefirst of three days’ play in the Logan Cup final againstManicaland, although they should have done better and would havedone much worse had the opposition held their catches. Theytotalled 345, gaining three batting points against Manicaland’sfour for bowling, but failed to part the Manicaland openers inseven overs before the close.Manicaland, the underdogs, were forced to play a weakened team,which included four schoolboys, as the Brents and Whittalls wereall missing: Jon Brent abroad, Gary and Guy Whittall in the WestIndies and Andrew Whittall unfit with a badly swollen finger.Mashonaland had lost Dirk Viljoen to the West Indies, but gainedTrevor Gripper and Bryan Strang who had returned.On a heavily overcast day, with rain a strong possibility at somestage, Manicaland put Mashonaland in to bat on winning the toss,hoping for the usual life in the Harare Sports Club pitch. Itproved to be quite a good batting pitch, though, although thebowlers did get some early life when they put it on the spot.Unfortunately that was all too infrequently. Leon Soma inparticular proved inaccurate, and the Manicaland bowlers ingeneral sent down too many short, wide balls. Openers GavinRennie and Gripper, not usually known for his fast scoring, wereable to play themselves in with ease, and most of the early runscame from pulls and cuts off rank bad balls.To make matters worse Manicaland, perhaps overcome by theoccasion, dropped four catches during the morning session, threeof them offered by Gripper. Rennie had much less luck,eventually falling to the second chance he gave, caught in thecovers just before lunch by Patrick Gada off captain MarkBurmester for 52. The opening stand was worth 126 and alreadythe sound of nails hammered into the Manicaland coffin could beheard. Off-spinner Steve Lawson bowled a good spell beforelunch, despite being hit for six over long-on by Gripper, and hadthe same batsman dropped at the wicket off an inside edge, a hardchance. At lunch Mashonaland went in on 134 for one (Gripper 68,Darlington Matambanadzo 5).The score progressed steadily after the interval, helped by somemore short balls from Soma down the leg side, giving the batsmenhooking practice which they gratefully accepted. Matambanadzoalso played some good-looking front-foot drives. Then suddenlySoma pitched one up on the off stump, got it to move away, andGripper (86) snicked it to Neil Ferreira behind the stumps. DanPeacock failed to make good use of his promotion to number four,playing over a yorker from Lawson to be bowled without scoring;Mashonaland 164 for three.Manicaland could have followed it up with the wicket of Evans on10, just after he had hit Lawson for six over wide long-on – buthe was dropped twice off successive balls from Lawson in thecover region. He celebrated with a six right into the Keg andMaiden, the restaurant situated in the clubhouse. Matambanadzohad virtually dried up since losing Gripper, but he eventuallyenabled Manicaland to improve their shocking catching percentageby hitting half-heartedly at Patrick Gada, to be caught off theoutside edge in the covers by Jason Sparrow. He made 22, withthe score 196 for four.At this stage it looked as if Manicaland might break through,with all the leading batsmen gone, but their bowling failed topress home the advantage. The two leg-spinners, Terry Denyer andHamilton Masakadza, were wayward, especially in direction, andthe batsmen piled in. Brad Robinson looked more confident at sixthan at the top of the order, while Don Campbell, ungainly tostart with as he often is, quickly used his reach to take heavytoll of the bad deliveries, especially on the leg side. Tea camewith Mashonaland pressing forward again on 252 for five (Robinson20, Campbell 35).After tea Campbell ran to his fifty, but was then superbly caughtby Denyer at mid-off while trying to hit over the top.Manicaland throughout this period kept most of their fielders inthe ring, with few on the boundary, which allowed the batsmen toget away with several rather poor-looking hits over the top. GusMackay would settle for nothing like this, but he did playhimself in with great care against Masakadza before lashing Gadaover long-off for six. Trying to pull Soma, though, he found thetop edge and Masakadza held a high catch at midwicket. He hadmade 16 out of 311 for seven.Robinson batted on, waiting for the loose ball, and could havemade a high score until he was surprised by a well-pitched ballfrom Soma that broke through his defences and shattered hisstumps for 61. The innings began to fade, with Strang lookingaggressive but unable to take the bowling apart as he likes todo, and Anton Hoffman (0), trying to glide Burmester, nudging alow catch that was well held by the keeper. This ninth wicket,for 337, was Manicaland’s fourth bowling point; now they had tobowl out Mashonaland for less than 350 to stay ahead on points.Everton Matambanadzo, with some lusty blows, looked ready to dothe job himself and got one of his swishes away to the square-legboundary. Strang stepped down the pitch to Soma and tried toswing him over the leg boundary, only for the ball to fly off theedge and give him two backward of point. Two balls later hetried it again, only to send up a massive skyer towards mid-on,where Brian James gamely staggered under it and finally held itsafely. Mashonaland were all out for 345; now the Manica battingwould be tested.Manicaland had a minimum of eight overs to survive, and theyplayed out seven before accepting the offer of bad light, playingthrough some not unduly accurate bowling from Mackay and Strang,together with a few superfluous words from the former. The totalat the close was eight without loss, Ferreira on 4 and Masakadzaon 3.