Clinical Yorkshire have it easy

Yorkshire produced a clinical all-round performance to defeat Sri Lanka’s Uva Next by five wickets in the Champions League Twenty20 opening qualifying match here on Tuesday.

Chasing 151 for victory, the English side completed the task with three balls to spare at the New Wanderers Stadium.

David Miller (39 not out) and Adil Rashid (36 not out) were the top scorers for the winners. Opener Phil Jaques gave the chase the right impetus after the early departure of skipper Andre Gale and Joe Root.

But after racing his way to 32 off 21 balls, Jaques offered a return catch to Dilshan Munaweera. Miller, who came back after retiring hurt, along with Rashid, then finished the job for Yorkshire, giving them hope of qualifying for the main tournament that kicks off on Saturday.

Miller struck four fours and a six during his 29-ball knock while Rashid found the fence two times and cleared it once during his 30-ball innings.

Earlier, after Uva opted to bat, a disciplined bowling effort helped Yorkshire restrict them to 150 for seven.

Steven Patterson and Moin Ashraf picked up two wickets apiece while there was one each for Ryan Sidebottom, Azeem Rafiq and Rashid. Thilina Kandamby top-scored for Uva with an unbeaten 29 while the other batsmen failed to convert the starts into big scores.
Kandambi aside, three other batsmen got to the 20s, including West Indian Shivnarine Chanderpaul, who contributed 27. Andrew McDonald made 17.

Brief scores: Uva Next 150/7 in 20 overs (Munaweera 22, Rajapaksa 24, S Chanderpaul 27, A McDonald 17, Patterson 2/30) lost to Yorkshire 151/5 in 19.3 overs (D Miller 39 n.o; A Rashid 36 n.o; Hodgson 18).