KARACHI South Zone became the inaugural champions of the Women's National Twenty20 Quadrangular Championship after they defeated Central Zone Blues by five wickets in the final at the National Stadium here on Sunday.

The match, which turned out to be the highest scoring one in the series, saw South Zone skipper Urooj Mumtaz winning the toss and putting Blues in to bat first.

Whether it was Kanwal Naz, Sana Mir or Urooj bowling, the Blues lost four of their finest batswomen just like that with South's lanky experienced wicket-keeper Batool Fatima starring with four dismissals as the Blues reached 132 for six in their 20 overs.

Marina Iqbal (19) was caught behind while Zeba Manzoor (6), Bismah Maroof (27) and Sabeen Abdul Samad (1) were all stumped one after the other by the alert wicket-keeper.

But despite all that Blues kept the scoreboard ticking as the partnership between Nida Dar and Almas Akram yielded 54 runs for the fourth wicket.

Almas herself contributed 24 before she was run out in the 19th over by Javeria Khan and Nida was on 47 when she was run out by Urooj in the final over but not before she hit a massive six.

A change in the batting order saw Sajjida Shah, who had been regularly opening the innings with Nain Abidi, starting South's run chase with Batool Fatima, whose turn to bat had not come yet during the entire tournament.

Nain came to the crease after the experiment failed when Batool was clean bowled by the medium-fast left-armer Almas for just five. But then Sajjida was dismissed too in the following over for 11. With the openers cooling their heals back in the pavilion, the responsibility fell on the shoulders of skipper Urooj who blocked one end sensibly.

This policy paid off well as Urooj helped Nain put on 48 invaluable runs before the latter was controversially given out for 28 by umpire Humaira Farah.

The match had to be stopped for a few minutes when South's coach Farrukh Bari as well as the skipper protested that Zeba's delivery on which Nain was caught by Sabeen at leg slip should have been called a no ball as there were only three fielders inside the circle at the time. But the umpire refused to budge and stood by her decision.

Although two more wickets fell after that incident, Urooj kept the South's hopes alive. Taking singles and doubles, she kept the runs coming. The final over saw South needing just three runs off the six balls and the Pakistan captain who throughout the tournament led South Zone from the front, appropriately finished the game with a match-winning boundary.

Urooj, who ended up with 39 off 32 balls, was named Player-of-the-Match, while she was jointly declared Player-of-the-Series with the best batswoman of the series Bismah Maroof. Besides the trophy, the winners also received a cheque of Rs75,000 while the runners-up walked way with Rs50,000.

Scoreboard

CENTRAL ZONE BLUES

Bismah Maroof st Batool b Kanwal 27

Marina Iqbal c Batool b Sana 19

Zeba Manzoor st Batool b Kanwal 6

Nida Dar run out 47

Almas Akram run out 24

Sabeen Abdul Samad st Batool b Urooj 1

Faryal Awan not out 1

EXTRAS (W-7) 7

TOTAL (for six wkts, 20 overs) 132

FALL OF WKTS 1-43, 2-56, 3-61, 4-115, 5-118, 6-132.

DID NOT BAT Sabahat Rasheed, Saima Jameel, Mehwish Tariq, Nimra Imran.

BOWLING Sumaiya Siddiqui 1-0-11-0 (1w); Masooma Junaid 1-0-11-0 (4w); Sajjida Shah 4-0-19-0 (1w); Sana Mir 4-0-29-1; Kanwal Naz 4-0-15-2; Javeria Khan 3-0-28-0 (1w); Urooj Mumtaz 3-0-19-1.

SOUTH ZONE

Sajjida Shah c Almas b Sabeen 11

Batool Fatima b Almas 5

Nain Abidi c Sabeen b Zeba 28

Urooj Mumtaz not out 39

Sana Mir lbw b Sabahat 5

Javeria Khan lbw b Nida 12

Naheeda Khan not out 20

EXTRAS (LB-3, W-12) 15

TOTAL (for five wkts, 19.4 overs) 135

FALL OF WKTS 1-19, 2-19, 3-67, 4-84, 5-103.

DID NOT BAT Sumaiya Khan, Masooma Junaid, Kanwal Naz Humaira Masroor.

BOWLING Sabeen Abdul Samad 4-0-29-1; Almas Akram 4-0-20-1 (4w); Zeba Manzoor 2-0-17-1 (4w); Marina Iqbal 2-0-13-0 (2w); Sabahat Rasheed 4-0-31-1 (2w); Nida Dar 3.4-0-22-1.

RESULT South Zone by five wickets.

UMPIRES Kausar Shah and Humaira Farah.

MATCH REFEREE Naeem Ahmed.

PLAYER-OF-THE-MATCH Urooj Mumtaz.

PLAYER-OF-THE-TOURNAMENT (shared) Urooj Mumtaz and Bismah Maroof.

 South Zone lift Women's Twenty20 title