KARACHI: Karachi Port Trust (KPT) are well on their way to regaining first-class status despite Omar Associates put up a strong batting second-innings show in the Patron’s Trophy Grade-II Cricket Tournament final at the National Stadium here on Tuesday.

KPT closed the penultimate day of the match at 21-0 in 11 overs after being set 358 for an outright victory. Their 57-run lead on the first innings — if the match ends in a draw — will guarantee them participating at the first-class level for only the third time in history after two successive seasons in 2003-04 and 2004-05 when Patron’s Trophy was a first-class competition in which only departments played.

Omar Associates’ slim hopes of victory recede further since it is still unknown whether their talisman Mohammad Amir takes the field on the last day after having pulled up on Monday with a hamstring niggle. Amir, who batted briefly for 13 not out, didn’t take the field and was resting with a strapping on his leg in closing overs of the evening.

And unless something out-of-the-blue takes place on Wednesday’s last day of the four-day fixture, a draw appears to be the most likely outcome as the bowlers struggled for the second day running on a docile pitch that has so far yielded 1,190 runs for the loss of just 26 wickets.

Last week’s semi-final between KPT and K-Electric on the same strip narrated a similar story when three days of cricket saw 1208 runs plundered while only 29 wickets went down.

The only time the bowlers had a say in this game was on Sunday’s opening day when Omar Associates had slumped to 120-7 in the 35th over as seamer Adeel Malik, in particular, took advantage of the moisture underneath the surface to extract movement that troubled the batsmen. But once the venom had vanished, Bilal Asif’s 103 guided his side to 349 all out.

As was the case on Monday’s second day, two batsmen — Umar Siddique and Fahad-ul-Haq — reached three figures as Omar Associates collected 384 runs in 77 overs before declaring their second innings at 414-8 after having resumed at the overnight tally of 30-0.

The left-handed duo provided the bulk of runs after openers Fazal Subhan (43 off 49 balls, five boundaries) and Danish Aziz (31 off 46, five fours) added 73 in 70 minutes.

Umar celebrated his inclusion in the Pakistan ‘A’ squad for the tour of Sri Lanka that starts from April 23 by batting attractively to strike 16 boundaries in his entertaining knock of 111 from 134 balls during a stat of 205 minutes. The 22-year-old left-hander from Lahore who averages an impressive 52.84 in 25 first-class appearances was tragically run out without adding to his tea-time score when his side had progressed to 262-4 in 62 overs.

Stand-in skipper Mohammad Waqas (41 off 105, seven boundaries) helped Umar put on 117 for the third wicket in 129 minutes before falling to a running catch in the deep by Babar Rehman off slow left-armer Nabeel Malik.

After Umar was gone, fellow left-hander Fahad-ul-Haq took up the gauntlet and went on to make a brisk 106 just before the declaration was made. The 32-year-old, who also hails from Lahore, struck seven fours and a brace of sixes during his 97-ball knock.

Jalat Khan also made his presence felt with two sixes in a 22-ball 28 while assisting Fahad in a 57-run stand for eighth wicket before he was well caught at long-on by the tall figure of Nadeem Javed who took the ball almost near his ankle.

Nabeel toiled through 32 overs on another sweltering day to claim four wickets for 142 runs. Babar Rehman took 2-38 but was surprisingly underused by Mohammad Hasan as the pace-bowling all-rounder bowled only 11 overs.

But for Adeel Malik it turned out be a harrowing experience after his first-day exploits of 5-126; his 28 overs went for 156 runs with just a solitary success — that of Danish Aziz first up.

Scoreboard

OMAR ASSOCIATES (1st Innings) 349 (Bilal Asif 103, Jalat Khan 70, Mohammad Amir 58, Fazal Subhan 34; Adeel Malik 5-126, Babar Rehman 3-58, Bilawal Nazir 2-69).

KARACHI PORT TRUST (1st Innings) 406-8 in 83 overs (Nadeem Javed 190, Anas Mahmood 112, Raza Ali Dar 37; Asif Raza 3-62, Bilal Asif 3-91).

OMAR ASSOCIATES (2nd Innings, overnight 30-0):

Fazal Subhan c Anas b Babar 43
Danish Aziz lbw b Adeel 31 Umar Siddique run out 111 Mohammad Waqas c Babar b Nabeel 41 Asif Raza c Hasan b Babar 0 Fahad-ul-Haq not out 106 Bilal Asif c Adeel b Nabeel 6 Jalat Khan c Nadeem b Nabeel 28 Mohammad Amir not out 13

EXTRAS (B-10, LB-3, W-5) 18

TOTAL (for eight wkts decl, 84 overs) 414

FALL OF WKTS: 1-73, 2-76, 3-193, 4-193, 5-262, 6-299, 7-330, 8-387.

BOWLING: Adeel Malik 28-3-156-1 (3w); Bilawal Nazir 9-0-53-0; Babar Rehman 11-2-38-2; Raza Ali Dar 4-0-12-0; Nabeel Malik 32-2-142-4.

KARACHI PORT TRUST (2nd Innings):

Nadeem Javed not out 2 Anas Mahmood not out 13

EXTRAS (B-5, NB-1) 6

TOTAL (for no wkt, 11 overs) 21

BOWLING (to date): Waqas Ahmed 3-2-9-0 (1nb); Jalat Khan 5-3-6-0; Asif Raza 2-1-1-0; Bilal Asif 1-1-0-0.

Published in Dawn, April 15th, 2015

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