Lahore faces another defeat, Quetta bowls out LQ by 18 runs to keep their hopes alive in the tournament in match 23 at Sheikh Zayed Cricket Stadium.
It all started for Quetta when Jake Weatherald, who was given a second chance by LQ put a steady knock of 48 runs after being asked to bat first.
He defended well at the first half of the innings bowled brilliantly by James Faulkner and a grasping spell from Rashid Khan.
While LQ bowlers did not get many runs followed by Shaheen Afridi, Faulkner, and Rashid, Quetta sensibly found opportunities to keep the scorecard moving.
Azam Khan 33(18) joined the party and got the better of Haris Rauf in which he scored 18 runs. He was joined with the skipper, Sarfaraz Ahmed in the second half before Faulkner came into the attack and got rid of them in 15th over.
It broke the back of Quetta as they only managed to get 158 runs in 20 overs but they got a good unit of the bowling department who did the job as required.
Usman Shinwari had a good pair of hands with the ball as he picked up Sohail Akhtar in the first at slips and the professor, Sarfaraz Ahmed was dismissed on a slower ball in his third over.
Mohammad Hasnain joined Shinwari in the party and got rid of the in-form, Fakhar Zaman to get Lahore batting order on knees.
Wickets kept falling from that as Khurram Shahzad and Mohammad Nawaz set the pace for Quetta when LQ were 66/7 in the 12th over and there was no way back for them.
Tim David gave some hopes to the Qalandars dugout and showed some fight but it was Shinwari’s day as he picked him up when he was 4 runs short of his half-century.
The last three tail-enders showed some hitting to get close to the margin of 18 runs although there were no hopes.
“Today’s pitch was a bit different. We wanted to take it to 160 at the 14 over the mark. Want to credit bowlers, Usman Shinwari for the early wickets. Getting four early was important. When a team is not doing well, it is difficult. But we played as a team today,”
said the winning captain, Sarfaraz Ahmed.
“Need to take responsibility in difficult overs. We spoke about roles, and we will speak about roles once again. Batters need to take responsibility otherwise we’ll get results like these. It was spinning a bit in the chase,”
said the losing captain, Sohail Akhtar.
Brief Scores: Quetta Gladiators 158/5 (Jake Weatherald 48; James Faulkner 3-25) beat Lahore Qalandars 140 (Tim David 46; Usman Shinwari 3-32, Khurram Shahzad 3-14) by 18 runs.