Israel seniors win European Division 3 trophy

For the first time ever, the Israel senior team has returned victorious from an official ICC tournament, having won the European Division 3 Championships held over the last week in Spain. The restructuring of world cricket over recent years has seen European cricket divided into five divisions, with Israel relegated from Division 2 in 2007 after losing a play-off match to Croatia. However a revamped and youthful Israel team, captained by Herschel Gutman, went to Spain keen to set the record straight and reclaim their Division 2 spot, which, as winners, they will be able to do in a challenge match, once again against Croatia, next month in Zagreb.

Israel began their tournament, held at La Manga on the Spanish south-east coast, with an almost perfect display in the field, dismissing Belgium for 116 with Yaniv Razpurker taking four wickets. However small targets can sometimes be more tricky to chase than bigger ones, and when 71 for four became 76 for eight Israel were heading for a rather embarrassing defeat. However lower order batsmen Shailesh Bangerra and Isaac Talkar refused to throw in the towel, taking the total to 101 before Bangerra fell for a vital 12. Last man Eliezer Samson then joined his Ramla teammate, and literally run by run, edged towards the target. There were leg before appeals and a clear run out opportunity missed before, with just three balls left in the game, Talkar edged a drive inches over the head of short third man to complete a great escape of Houdini proportions. Talkar had scored 15* from 94 balls and Samson 7* from 29.

Israel were far too strong for Malta in their second game, as Bangerra, promoted to open the batting, Raymond Aston and Gabi Shachat all scored half centuries in a total of 263 for 6, before the bowlers dismissed Malta for just 90. The wickets were shared evenly, with Adrian Vard, taking two for six, celebrating his first international wickets.

Game three was always expected to be the hardest match of the week with the Isle of Man expected to provide the strongest challenge to Israel winning the title, meaning the game between the teams was almost like a final. Israel suffered a huge setback when Aston had to withdraw suffering from a suspected hernia. Talkar provided the early breakthrough after the Isle of Man had chosen to bat, before a brilliant piece of fielding by Steven Shein at point resulted in the first of four run outs for the Maxmen. Samson and Massil both bowled their 10 overs with an economy rate of less than one, and Shein wrapped up the innings with three for 13 as the Isle of Man managed just 80. Memories of the Belgium game began flooding back as wickets began to tumble to very good new ball bowling, and almost unbelievably Israel had slumped to 25 for 6 after 26 overs. With the score on 31 and runs seemingly impossible to score, the momentum of the game suddenly changed as two waist high full tosses were punished by Gutman for boundaries. With the score on 57 Gutman (20 from 96 balls) fell, and with 24 runs still needed that man Talkar strode out to join Massil who had added 32 with his captain. Talkar further established his status as the best finisher in international cricket since Michael Bevan with a calmly played 11*, and with Massil not out on 12, Israel completed a three-wicket win with two overs to spare.

Israel's next challenge was the host team Spain, who were also expected to provide stiff opposition. Batting first having won the toss, another top order collapse left Israel 32 for four. Youngsters Safania Nagavkar (17) and Schachat (28), two of the three U19 players in the squad, managed to stem the flow of wickets, although scoring was once again very difficult with the rate hardly climbing above two runs per over. A score of 109 was well below par, even on a field where runs had been hard to come by during the week. The bowling wasn't quite as good as previous games and chances were also missed in the field, as Spain claimed the victory by four wickets.

The final day of the tournament began with any of three teams - Israel, Spain or Isle of Man - able to win it. Spain knew they probably would win it if they could defeat Isle of Man as their run rate was better than any of the other teams. Isle of Man needed to defeat Spain by a large margin and hope Portugal either defeated Israel or Israel won by a narrow margin, whilst Israel needed both a big win against Portugal and an Isle of Man win over Spain by not too large a margin to take the trophy. Samson led the Israel attack with three early wickets, a Gutman slower ball removed Portugal's best batsmen, two run outs, one of them a brilliant direct hit from point by Nir Dokarkar, and Portugal were all out for 112. Meanwhile Isle of Man had recovered from 25 for 3 to post 211 against Spain. Israel knew they had to score their runs as fast as possible, and Aston (26), playing despite his injury, launched a couple of big shots, Gutman (38) found the boundaries regularly, before Razpurker (14*) finished things off inside 18 overs. The statisticians plugged in the numbers, and the equations became quite simple. Isle of Man would have to bowl out Spain for less than 78 runs to have a better run rate than Israel, Spain would need to win. At that stage Spain were 63 for 6. When news came through that Spain had passed 78 Israel began mild celebrations which picked up a few notches when the result was confirmed that Spain had been bowled out for 111.

As for the Israel squad, the success was built around a strong team spirit and fighting attitude. Samson, Massil, Shein and Gutman all bowled well, the catching and ground fielding was generally good although much work remains to do on the batting, particularly against swing bowlers.

Israel now heads to Zagreb next month, looking to revenge their defeat in Tel Aviv of two years ago, and reclaim their spot in Division 2.

Scorecards, match reports, statistics and tournament photos can be found on www.icc-europe.org