Strong Panthers, Markhor reach LC Media Cricket final

F.P. Report

PESHAWAR: Strong Panthers and Markhor reached the final after recording victories against their respective rivals in the semi-finals of the ongoing Liaison Corporation Media Cricket League being played here at Peshawar Sports Complex on Thursday.

PPC Panthers and PPC Markhor won their matches and booked their tickets for the final. IG Police Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Moazzam Jah Ansari and Special Assistant Barrister Muhammad Ali Saif graced the occasion as guests.

Sports activities for journalists are welcome. PPC Qalandar and PPC Panthers played in the first semi-final of the ongoing LC Media Cricket League at Qayyum Sports Complex. Qalandar won the toss and batted first and scored 93 runs for the loss of 6 wickets in the stipulated 10 overs and Panthers got a target of 94 runs to win.

Siddique Bangash, Khalid-ur-Rehman and Malik Qaiser scored 13 runs each. On behalf of the Panthers, Zahid Imdad and Zarshad took two wickets each, while Tanveer and Shabbir Jan took one wicket each.

In response, the Panthers won the match by completing the target in the seventh over at the loss of 3 wickets. Zakir 23, Zahid 22, Israr 15 and captain Ali Akbar were the prominent batsmen with 14 runs. Haroon and Ibrahim Khan dismissed one player each.

Zayed Imdad was named Man of the Match. The chief guest was IG Police Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Moazzam Jah Ansari who highly appreciated the organization of Media Cricket League. He said that both the media and the police have a difficult job and both of them don’t have equal opportunities for entertainment.

In such a situation, holding the media cricket league is a welcome initiative. In the second semi-final, the teams of PPC Spider and PPC Markhor competed. Markhor won the toss and batted first and scored 129 runs in 10 overs. Yasir scored 34 runs and Ajmal scored 31 runs, but Irshad Maidani’s smoky and brilliant batting played an important role in Markhor’s big target.

On behalf of Spider, Waqar and Naeem Babar managed to dismiss one player each. In reply, Markhor’s brilliant bowling restricted Spider’s team to 87 runs in the allotted overs with eight of their players dismissed. Naeem Babar was outstanding with 29 runs and Wahid Khan with 15 runs. On behalf of Markhor, Irshad took 2 wickets while Shehzad and Rizwan took one wicket each.

Arshad Yousafzai’s single over was very brilliant and decisive, he grabbed four wickets to the pavilion for just 2 runs and managed to score the first hat-trick of the tournament. Irshad Maidani was awarded the Man of the Match for his brilliant all-rounder performance.

Special Assistant to chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for Information and Broadcasting Barrister Muhammad Ali Saif was the chief guest while CEO of Liaison Corporation Muhammad Usman, President of Anjuman Tajran Abdullah Wazir President of Peshawar Press Club M Riaz, General Secretary Shahzad Fahad, Khyber Union of Journalists.

General Secretary Imran Yousafzai, senior journalist Arshad Aziz Malik and others were also present on the occasion. Barrister Saif said that sports activities are very important for journalists and the Tehreek-e-Insaf government is taking important steps to promote sports in the province. (APP)