Lahore Lions registered a commanding 55-run victory over Southern Express in the Oppo Champions League Twenty20 at the Shahid Veer Narayan Singh stadium on Tuesday. Spurred by skipper Mohammad Hafeez’s 40-ball 67, the Lions reached 164 for six and bundled out their rivals for 109.
When the chase began, Southern Express matched the Lions stride for stride in its scoring rate, right until the halfway mark. With the field spread out and boundaries hard to come by, the fourth-wicket pair of Jehan Mubarak and Angelo Perera stuck to singles and twos.
Mubarak launched Rasool over the long-on ropes, perhaps hoping for an encore of his counterpart’s slog-fest.
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That was not to be as he holed out to Siddique at long-off. The slide set it in by then, Farveez Maharoof beaten all ends up and Angelo Perera picked up by Siddique at mid-off. Seekuge Prasanna was the fourth to fall with only half a dozen runs added, again off Riaz, but across the strip at mid-wicket.
With the top-order folding tamely, no lash could be expected from the tail. The Sri Lankan side reached three figures with less than a quarter of the innings to go. The inevitable could only be delayed.
Promoting Umar Siddique, after the Lions were invited to bat first, appeared to be a sound opening gambit, as he put on 40 with Ahmed Shehzad. The pair didn’t last too much longer though, Siddique nicking a steepler from Farveez Mahroof to stumper Kusal Perera.
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The strapping speedster accounted for his second and third victims, Shehzad and Nasir Jamshed, also within the circle.
If the Pakistan side’s total languished under 90 after 15 overs, Mohammad Hafeez was intent on setting things right. After sweeping Seekuge Prasanna for a boundary, the Lions skipper came down heavily on the leggie, hoisting him over the ropes thrice and on the trot. If there was a lesson in leading by example, this was it.
After another boundary clearing blow, Hafeez departed, lofting Ishan Jayaratne to long off Angelo Perera, but not before seeing his side to a sizeable score.
His squad remained unchanged from the previous outing, while Southern Express brought in Sandaken Lakshan and Sampath Tilakaratne for Sachith Pathirana and Yasoda Lanka.