A very new-look Cape Town Cricket Club First XI, fielding no fewer than six debutants to the team, kicked off the new 2024/25 Western Province Cricket Association club cricket season in the first of a double-header day of T20 games, beginning by taking on the newly-promoted Ottoman Cricket Club at the neutral venue of the University of the Western Cape.
In one of the First XI’s best and most enduring records, they entered the contest having defeated Ottoman in every one of their eleven previous encounters, stretching all the way back to 2011 and spanning all three formats of the game. On this occasion though, with Cape Town having lost about a dozen veteran regulars over the past two seasons that collectively represent over 1400 caps’ worth of First XI experience, it seemed as though Ottoman now had their best opportunity ever to reverse this trend. Ultimately, however, Cape Town still had more than enough firepower to overwhelm their opponents, systematically skittling them inside 16 overs before romping home to a bonus-point victory with almost half their overs left unused.
The Plumstead-based outfit seized the initiative from the very outset, inserting their opponents on a sticky pitch that they took full advantage of. Opening the bowling with their two most experienced available bowlers, left-arm spinner Michal Lord struck in each of his first three overs to clean up the Ottoman top three, in the process recording the best bowling performance of his 49-match First XI career to date. At the other end meanwhile, seamer Nicholas Scott also got stuck in almost as quickly, to bag a brace of scalps himself. The net result left the Ottoman innings destroyed beyond repair in barely half an hour, as they collapsed dramatically to 28-6.
There would be no chance for recovery either, as the support bowling continued to strike regularly. Thus just one of the Ottoman batters (having been missed at slip when 3*) managed to reach double figures, as they succumbed for just 57 – barely sneaking past Cape Town’s own 56 all out at Green Point in 2021 to avoid posting the second-lowest score in any of the First XI’s matches played since the start of the 2020s.
Having conceded just two boundary fours in the process, Cape Town then confidently set about chasing down their paltry target, breaking the back of the task by moving smoothly to 26-0 from the first five overs. Both openers then fell in consecutive overs as Ottoman induced a slight stutter, but in a typically aggressive innings, new skipper Tristan Coetzee survived a simple enough chance offered to wide long on to crunch three fours in the space of ten balls faced. As a result, even though Cape Town lost a third wicket with the scores level, a thumping win with a full nine overs to spare still followed by the end of that same over.
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