LAHORE: Half-centuries from Ali Asad, Asad Shafiq and Ramiz Raja Junior steered Pakistan Cricket Club Karachi to a splendid eight-wicket triumph against Sialkot’s Toni Club in the final of the inaugural Pakistan Fazal Mahmood Inter-club Cricket Tournament here at the LCCA ground on Friday.

Chase a modest 186 in 50 overs, the Karachi-based Pakistan CC raced to the target in just 32.3 overs while losing only two wickets.

Ali cracked four boundaries and one six in his 90-ball 70 not out while Ramiz made 53 not out (six fours, one six) off 66 balls. Test cricketer Asad Shafiq’s 40-ball 55 was laced with three big sixes and four fours as the winners raced to the target while 17.3 overs play was remaining.

Earlier, only Tabraiz Butt (55, three fours) and captain Bilal Asif (45, four sixes, two fours) could give some respectability to Toni Club’s total as Pakistan CC pacers Mir Hamza and Anwar Ali equally shared eight wickets between them for 17 and 25 runs, respectively.

PCB chairman Najam Sethi, who was the chief guest on the occasion, awarded the prizes.

The winning captain Sarfraz Ahmed — who is also Pakistan’s Test, ODI and T20 skipper — received a cash prize of Rs300,000 while Bilal Asif was handed a cheque of Rs200,000.

Mir Hamza for his brilliant bowling was named the man of the final.

Sajid Iqbal (Bahawalpur) was declared the best batsman of the tournament; Hammal of Panjgur Club was picked as the best bowler while Mirpur’s Ikram Hussain earned the title of event’s best wicket-keeper and Zeeshan Gul (Hyderabad) was chosen as the best fielder.

Earlier, Aizad Saiyed, the head of the Fazal Mahmood inter-club tournament project, revealed that 57,155 players representing 2896 clubs from across Pakistan participated in the event during which over 2300 matches were organised.

Meanwhile, Sethi on the occasion declined to answer media a number of questions regarding his future as PCB chief.

Published in Dawn, August 18th, 2018