Defending champion of the Nigeria Cricket Federation (NCF) Girls’s T20 Invitational Event, Nigeria’s Senior Feminine crew started their title defence with a 54-run win over Sierra Leonian Girls’s crew on Sunday, on the Tafawa Balewa cricket oval in Lagos.
Nigeria had elected to bat after profitable the toss, and set a 137 run (for the lack of two wickets) hurdle for the Sierra Leonian facet of their innings. Favour Eseigbe, contributed 44 runs from 48 balls, whereas Peculiar Agboya and Esther Sandy left 33 and 30 balls apiece within the inning.
Within the second inning, Ann-Marie Monica Kamara and Janet Kowa pulled in 22 and 21 runs respectively in a bid to chase the rating rampart Nigerian facet earlier than ultimately capitulating, with eight wickets down.
President of the Nigeria Cricket Federation, Uyi Akpata, mentioned that the occasion is a part of the quite a few avenues that the NCF has designed to advertise the sport, and it’s pleasing to see rising worldwide curiosity across the event.
“The Nigeria Cricket Federation Girls T20 Invitational Event has been on the rise, and the standard of video games have helped Nigeria achieve prominence as we now rank twenty ninth on the earth, down from the thirty eighth that we occupied as just lately as 2021.”
In response to him, the win over Sierra Leone on Sunday additionally speaks to the extent of funding and work that the board and technical crew have put into the crew and developmental efforts.
“Nigeria has virtually ridden on the performances and exposures that occasions like this have supplied to develop into a pressure in feminine cricket on the continent,” he mentioned.
Earlier within the day, Rwanda brushed apart the specter of the next rating Tanzania to carry them to a 33-run win.
With a batting effort of Uwase Merveille (33 runs), and the bowling prowess of Ishimwe Henriette and Irera Rosine (three wickets every), Rwanda checked Tanzania’s potential for overturning their first inning’s 119 runs, by leaving them at 86 all out.
Zambia’s Copper Queens put behind them the harrowing expertise of watching a crew mate die in camp, to shock Ghana’s Black Queens 1-0 in West Africa, and have the energy, stamina and motivation to carry their very own in opposition to the guests in Ndola on Monday.
Tunisia’s senior ladies have a mountain to climb in Rabat, after they confront fast-improving and highly-motivated Morocco’s Atlas Lionesses who beat them 2-1 in entrance of their very own followers on Friday.
The winner on mixture will likely be eligible to sq. as much as the winner between Zambia and Ghana.
Solely two tickets can be found for Africa within the 16-nation Girls’s Olympic Soccer Event.
For the Nigeria/Cameroon conflict in Abuja, which kicks off at 4pm, CAF has appointed Namibian official Ndemugwanitha Twanyanyukwa as referee.
