LAHORE, April 28: Karachi Zebras were denied a place in the triangular phase of the ABN Amro Twenty20 Cup despite initially winning their Pool ‘B’ fixture against Sialkot Stallions (KZ) at the Qadhafi Stadium on Thursday.

The Zebras had apparently qualified until the PCB intervened to declare the match void after Shoaib Malik, the Stallions captain, purposely let the Zebras win the match by four runs in a bid to keep Lahore Eagles out of reckoning.

Needing 11 from the game’s final over and with Shoaib going great guns at 88, the Stallions, already out of contention, made no attempt to win the match. They scored just six in that last over.

Shoaib in his post-match comment admitted that he deliberately lost the match to prevent Lahore Eagles from qualifying for the next stage.

Lahore Eagles defeated the Stallions by three wickets in the opener in a match in which both the teams were penalized 12 for slow over-rate. But Shoaib objected that they were not intimated about the rule.

The Zebras made a fine start through skipper Shadab Kabir (45 off 41 balls with five fours and one six) and Khalid Latif (33 off 33 balls with six fours and one six) before finishing their innings at 175 for five in 20 overs.

Scoreboard

KARACHI ZEBRAS:

Shadab Kabir b Shoaib 45

Khalid Latif c Imran b Rahman 33

Fahad Iqbal c Rahman b Adeel 29

Afsar Nawaz b Adeel 30

Javed Qadeer not out 13

Wasim Naeem c Khalid b Adeel 9

Mohammad Hasnain not out 1

EXTRAS (LB-7, NB-8) 15

TOTAL (for five wkts, 20 overs) 175

FALL OF WKTS: 1-59, 2-111, 3-151, 4-156, 5-167.

BOWLING: Nadeem Javed 2-0-21-0; Nawaz Sardar 2-0-10-0; Abdul Rahman 4-0-36-1; Shoaib Malik 4-0-39-1; Qaiser Abbas 4-0-24-0; Adeel Malik 4-0-38-3.

SIALKOT STALLIONS:

Imran Nazir c Khalid b Saeed 30

Shoaib Malik not out 88

Shahid Yousuf run out 0

Bilal Hussain c Wasim b Atif 27

Shahid Siddique not out 18

EXTRAS (LB-2, W-4, NB-2) 8

TOTAL (for three wkts, 20 overs) 171

FALL OF WKTS: 1-36, 2-43, 3-106.

DID NOT BAT: Qaiser Abbas, Hafiz Khalid, Nadeem Javed, Abdul Rahman, Nawaz Sardar, Adeel Malik.

BOWLING: Saeed Khan 3-0-34-1; Mohammad Hasnain 4-0-38-0; Wasim Naeem 4-0-28-0; Adnan Malik 1-0-8-0; Danish Kaneria 4-0-41-0; Atif Maqbool 4-1-20-1.

RESULT: Void.

UMPIRES: Riazuddin-Ijaz Ahmed.

MATCH-REFEREE: Khateeb Rizwan.

MAN-OF-THE-MATCH: Shadab Kabir.