Keegan Petersen hit 158 at less than a run a ball to lead Steinhoff Maties to a colossal 171-run victory over the Burma Lads CC on day two of the 28th annual Momentum National Club Championship in Pretoria on Thursday.
Petersen’s 158 came off 150 deliveries, including 17 fours and three sixes. He, along with David Bedingham (99 off 86 balls), who fell a painful one run short of what would have been a well played century, led Maties to 333 for four at the end of their 50 overs.
The Lads were no match for Maties. Only Gihahn Cloete managed a half-century, hitting 58 from 77 balls, followed by Aubrey Swanepoel’s 39 from 44. The batting order fell victim to a clinical bowling attack led by Keegan Biassoni, who took a brilliant five wickets for 36.
In arguably the most anticipated match of section one, Mecer Madibaz PE beat Assupol Tuks by two wickets. Tuks won the toss and elected to bat first, posting 237 for nine at the end of their innings. They promptly lost the opening pair of Murray Coetzee and Aiden Markram without scoring in the first three overs of the match. Gerry Pike steadied the ship with his 69 off 77 balls, but he lost partners, Jacques Snyman and Evan Jones for one and three respectively.
Rudi Claasen (22) followed at the start of the 20th over, but skipper Heinrich Klaasen joined Pike for a 43-run sixthth-wicket partnership, followed by a 44-run seventh-wicket stand between Klaasen and Corbin Bosch (26) after the loss of Pike in the 28th.
The Madibaz attack was impressive. Jason Davidson was the pick of the bowlers with three for 31 in eight overs, with Henco Vorstman and Tian Koekermoer taking two each.
Their batting performance saw more of a concerted effort from the line-up, after the initial losses of Eddie Moore (five) and Curtis Samboer (16) in the first seven overs. The most notable contributions were made by Matthew Christensen (52), Koekemoer (35 from 28 balls) and David White (35 from 42 balls), with Jason Davidson and Bradley Dolley chipping in with a respective 27 and 21 runs for victory.
In the last match of section one, University of Free State bounced back from Wednesday’s loss to beat North West University by 26 runs.
In section two, Umar Asad scored 110 off 119 balls to lead University of Johannesburg (UJ) to a 113-run win over Benoni Northerns. They posted 229 for six, with the second highest score supplied by Yaseen Valli with 40 from 81 deliveries.
Benoni’s reply was hampered by Harry van Straaten’s outstanding five for 45. He, along with Matt Varner and Sean Jamison who took two for 11 and two for 20 respectively, saw Benoni restricted to 116 with only number seven batsman Mark Robey managing the team’s highest score of 47 runs.
In other matches, the HollywoodBets.Net Crusaders maintained their unbeaten streak when they snuck a two-wicket victory over Erdinger Durbanville CC, while Union Stars recovered from their 54-run defeat 24 hours earlier, to beat United CC from Cape Town by three wickets at Memorial Park.
