Buddhi Samarawickrama cracked an unbeaten 46 runs to be adjudged the Man of the Match as Thurstan coasted to a 22-run victory against St. Joseph’s in the St. Joseph’s Twenty 20 Knockout Cricket Tournament finals at Darley Road on Sunday.
Thurstan taking the first lease of the wicket made 173 runs in their allotted 20 overs. While Buddhi Samarawickrama top scored with 46, Hasitha Peiris and Kanishka Alwitigala scored valuable 37 and 32 runs respectively.
In reply, the hosts just managed to score 151 runs for the loss of 9 wickets.
Thurstan bowler Shehan Perera, who took a hat trick in a first round match on Saturday was named the Best Bowler in the tournament. The champions Thurstan was awarded a cash prize of Rs. 50,000 along with the Challenge Trophy.
Thurstan entered the final after routing Nalanda in the semi-final played in the morning. In the rain curtailed semi-final, Thurstan reached a massive 133 runs in 12 overs mainly on the back of a fine 72 runs by Praneeth Jayasinghe.
Thurstan duo, Rishi Ukwatta and Shehan Perera took two wickets each to restrict Nalanda to 85 runs in their 12 overs.
The Best Batsman and the Player to hit Most Number of Sixes awards went to St. Benadict’s batsman Tharindu Heshan, who excelled in the preliminary round matches with a 46 ball hundred against Isipatana. He hammered a 117 runs in just 46 balls. It included 10 fours and 10 sixes in his score.
Scores in the semi-final
Thurstan- 133 for 7 in 12 overs (Praneeth Jayasinghe 72, Kanishka Alvitigala 18; Gihan Rupasinghe 3/26)
Nalanda-85 for 8 in 12 overs (Gihan Rupasinghe 33, Lahiru Wickramasinghe 15; Rishi Ukwatta 2/11, Shehan Perera 2/12)
Scores in the final
Thurstan- 173 all out in 20 overs (Buddhi Samarawickrama 42 n.o., Hasitha Perera 37, Kanishka Alwitigala 32; Dimuth Karunaratne 3/26, Nirmal Rajapakse 2/23, Rajive Wijesinghe 2/38)
St. Joseph’s- 151 for 9 in 20 overs (Roshen Silva 57; Rishi Ukwatta 2/25)