Red Bull Campus Cricket: Karachi University seal world finals berth

Tournament ends with one-sided victory for reigning Pakistan champions.

KARACHI: Karachi University (KU) were in supreme form at the Moin Khan Academy ground Karachi on Saturday night as they defeated University of Sargodha (UOS) by 10 wickets.

KU was the team to beat in the Super 11 stage of Red Bull Campus Cricket and the reigning Pakistan champions booked a place in the world finals of the event for the second consecutive year.

Stalwarts and present day Pakistan stars like Moin Khan, Rashid Latif,  Nadeem Khan, Faisal Iqbal, Anwar Ali, Sarfaraz Ahmed and Khurram Manzoor inspired the KU team, who were simply too hot to handle for UOS.

Batting first, Sargodha found the moving and sharply spinning ball under the lights an almighty challenge.

Leg-spinner Shahzaib Khan ran through the visitors’ line-up returning stunning figures of five wickets for a mere six runs in 3.5 overs.

Opener Umar Raza, who scored 28 runs, was the only batsman to offer some semblance of resistance to the rampant KU bowlers.

KU’s batsmen cantered towards the small target in reply, as openers Haris Ali and Ammar Hasan finished the job in only 10 overs, to register an overwhelming win over their deflated opponents.

Shahzaib was declared man-of-the-match.

KU is now set to represent Pakistan in the world finals, which will be staged in London later in the year.

Former captains back campus cricket tournament

The event found support from former Pakistan captains Moin Khan and Rashid Latif. Moin, who coached the national team in the Asia Cup and WorldTwenty20 in Bangladesh, stated that the tournament has helped identify talented cricketers from across the country.

“The event has provided these young cricketers a great platform of showcasing their talent; if they work hard from here, they can go a long way”, said Moin.

Similar sentiments were echoed by Latif: “The organisation of this event is a tremendous step for the encouragement of these youngsters, in our college days we never had such facilities, the players should make the most of the opportunities coming their way.”

Published in The Express Tribune, April 14^th, 2014.

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