Uva Next upset Wayamba to reach SLPL 2012 final

In a match replete with high drama befitting a semi-final, the individual performance of the tournament from Jacob Oram helped Uva Next derail favourites Wayamba United by twenty runs in national capital. Oram’s 17-ball forty one electrified an Uva Next innings that had spluttered to eighty nine for five from thirteen.5 overs, before he before he overcame a poor begin with the ball to gut the Wayamba United middle order with 3 wickets for sixteen from four overs.

Despite being reduced to twenty seven for seven within the sixth over, Azhar Mahmood and Isuru Udana placed on a hundred and twenty for the eighth wicket to resurrect the chase, and provides some hope to thousands of Wayamba fans WHO had created the long trip. The required-rate well-tried too high, however, and Wayamba United ended at 151 for eight.

Jacob Oram turned in the performance of the tournament © Shaun Roy/SPORTZPICS/SLPL

Such a close contest did not seem seemingly when Oram’s efforts with bat and ball. He scored thirty of his forty one from sixes, the first of which came stunningly, from a leading edge. He charged Akila Dananjaya and swung across the line, and though the ball spun in the opposite direction to the one he’d anticipated, the heave had enough power to carry it over the ropes at long-off. Oram did not misread Brad Hogg in the next over though, once he clobbered him high over midwicket for 6, nor was he fooled by 2 consecutive slower balls from Mahmood that he blasted straight. His last six was the best of the lot. The lofted cover drive had once been a hallmark of Oram’s batting eclat, and he reprised the shot another time to send the ball into the Premadasa terraces. He ought to have launched the next ball, into the night as well, but found backward point with a half-hearted stroke to a knee-high full toss.

Oram bled thirteen from his first over when he took the new ball, but returned in the second to remove Mahela Jayawardene with one that jagged in off the seam to strike the batsman in front of the stumps, albeit a little high on the pads. Sachithra Senanayake meanwhile had both openers stumped at the other end, though Dinesh Chandimal was the architect of his own demise when he failed to keep his foot behind the line while reaching out to drive the ball. 2 wickets in Oram’s next over left the chase in tatters, as he removed Shehan Jayasuriya and Abdul Razzaq with consecutive short deliveries, before Umar Gul extended the collapse further with 2 scalps of his own.

Mahmood and Udana had no choice but to rebuild with caution from the collapse, or risk capitulating altogether. The pair took the score to fifty seven for seven by the end of the 12th over before Mahmood launched his offensive, blasting 3 leg-side boundaries off Charith Jayampathi and hitting seventeen from andrew McDonald’s fifteenth over. Jayampathi’s next over cost sixteen before Udana also began to find the boundary, launching Senanayake into the stands twice in the eighteenth over to make the requirement that had once seemed impossible, suddenly conceivable, with thirty four required off the last 2 overs.

Gul’s experience in the nineteenth, though, put paid to Wayamba United’s hopes. The batsmen could manage only eight, leaving twenty six to get from the last over. They made only four.

Earlier, Chanderpaul had rarely looked for boundaries for much of his innings, choosing instead to collect risk-free runs into the outfield as his team-mates continued to founder at the other end. His 24-ball association with Jacob Oram brought fifty six runs, but at the end of that partnership, he had still only made twenty six from thirty. A string of boundaries, including a huge reverse-swept six, took him to fifty and lifted his aspect to 171 for six.

Uva Next 171 for 6 (Chanderpaul 50*, Oram 41) beat Wayamba United 151 for 8 (Mahmood 75, Udana 42, Oram 3-16) by 20 runs