Mixed day for Negev Academy, Lions BS maintain winning start

Samson Borgharkar - 86 off 88 balls for Lions BS © Israel Cricket

Both Negev Academy teams were in action over the weekend, with the club recording mixed results. The first team lost by 34 runs to Dimona C in Division 2, whilst the second team defeated Rishon Lezion by 4 wickets in Division 3. In other Division 3 action, Lions Be'er Sheva maintained their winning start to the season, defeating Kiryat Gat by 71 runs, and Ra'anana 2nd's recorded their first league win, comfortably beating Dimona A by 5 wickets.

A fine innings of 71 from Avraham Benjamin led Dimona C to a total of 193 against the Negev youngsters in Dimona on Saturday. Jacky Divekar contributed 35. The Academy would have been disappointed with their reply, dismissed for 159, with Oren Chincholkar (32) top scoring.

Ramla scored their first win of the season, putting in a fine performance to beat Diamonds by 5 wickets. Batting first, only Prashant (49) and Anis Zaveri (38) made sizeable contributions in a Diamond score of 181. Joel Saigwakar (57*) played well to take Ramla to a comfortable victory.

Lions Be'er Sheva remain the team to beat in Division 3, putting together another impressive display to defeat Kiryat Gat in Be'er Sheva. Samson Borgharkar (86) and Norman Sankar (40) both took a liking to the Kiryat Gat attack, for whom Brian Desouza took 5 for 27. Chasing 221 to win, Raymond Waskar (5 for 32) ran through the Kiryat Gat middle order, after Avshalom Sankar (17) and Avi Digorkar (45) had added 55 for the first wicket. The visitors were dismissed for 149.

In a low scoring game played in Ashdod, the Negev Academy 2nd team bowled out Rishon for 111, although it was more a case of self destruction as Rishon suffered no fewer than 4 run outs. Kamal Chudasama scored 44 for the Rishon. Despite losing 6 wickets to tight Rishon bowling, the Academy reached their target with 2.4 overs to spare.

Reuven Bergman (50*) and Rafi Schachat (45) were the star performers for Ra'anana 2, in their 5 wicket win over Dimona A. Batting first, a depleted Dimona team was all out for 155, with Dani Divekar scoring 52.