Netanya secured their third successive win of the season with a narrow 2 wicket win over Ashdod A, achieved with just 4 balls to spare. The match, played on Friday at Hadar Yosef, was extremely tense and evenly balanced right down to the very end. Ashdod won the toss and elected to bat first. The loss of two early wickets was followed by an excellent partnership of 105 for the 3rd wicket between Menashe Wadhuker (62) and Dharmesh Tyagi (33).

With both batsman scoring freely it was going to take something special to break the stand, and it came in the form of a stunning catch by Gedaliya Auerbach, who came charging in from the midwicket boundary, taking the catch inches from the ground, to claim the wicket of Dharmesh. Just 2 overs later Wadhuker also fell to a brilliant catch, this time by Solly Bergman on the square leg fence.

Sharon Kurulkar (25) and Hillel Awasker (26) kept the momentum going as Ashdod reached the very respectable score of 208/7 off their 40 overs. The Netanya run chase was built around a well paced 44 from Steven Shein, although significant contributions also came from Auerbach (31) and Rafi Zauer (27).

Requiring 78 runs from the final 10 overs, all the middle and lower order bastman scored a few quick runs, leaving No 10 batsman Colin Shachat to face the final over with 5 runs required for victory.

The first ball was smashed away to the square leg boundary for 4, and the next was scrambled away for the victory run.

In a match played on Saturday, reigning champions Tel Aviv slumped to a heavy 102 run defeat to Neve Yonatan, who scored their first win of the season. Batting first, Neve Yonatan got off to a flying start, with 75 runs on the board after just 9 overs. Tel Aviv managed to put a halt on the scoring rate, as Paul Thomas with 4 wickets and Herschel Gutman with 2 restricted the score to 165. None of the Tel Aviv batsman managed to get going as they collapsed to 63 all out in just 20 overs.

In the rounds other game also played on Saturday, Lions Lod eventually got their season underway with rain and other problems having interrupted the start of their season. Their opponents, Ramle, were dismissed for just 100, which Lod passed without too much worry, to win by 6 wickets.

© ISR