A June 11 newswire on the Cricket Canada website provided the news that the Western Canada T20 tournament was taking place on the turf wickets at the Victoria Park Cricket Ground, Edmonton, Alberta this past weekend (June 14 & 15, 2014). Some may not have noticed this announcement, so the opportunity to visit the event may have been lost.
Scores follow:
Game 1 – Alberta vs Manitoba:
Alberta -160/7 in 20 overs. Rizwan Saleem 55, Sudeepta Aurka 30. Manitoba 91 all out, Harpreet Manes 26, Rajat Karval 4-27-3. Alberta wins by 69 runs.
Man of the match Rizwan Saleem.
Game 2 – BC vs Saskatchewan:
BC – 139/7 in 20 overs. Gauravpreet Singh 42, Jimmy Hansra 26. Saskatchewan -130/8 in 20.
BC wins by 9 runs.
Man of the match Guravpreet Singh.
Game 3 – BC vs Manitoba
BC – 158/7 in 20 overs. Gaurav Kumar 44, Jimmy Hansra 48.
Manitoba 116/5 in 20, Monty Sharma 46 Herman 4-13-1.
BC wins by 42 runs.
Man of the Match – Jimmy Hansra
Western T20 – Day 2
Game 4 – Saskatchewan vs Manitoba. Saskatchewan -169/8, Viru Chohan 78, Harpreet Sandhu 50. Monty Sharma 4-28-5. Manitoba – 139/9, Sunny Mitharu 22. M Rashid 3-15-2.
Saskachewn wins by 30 Runs.
Man of the Match: Viru Chohan
Game 5 – Alberta vs BC
BC – 109 all-out. Shamsher 26, Khurram Chohan 4-12-2, AB 110/8 in 19.3 overs, Rizwan Saleem 35, Yasoob Haq 27.
Alberta wins by 2 wkts.
Man of Match, Khurram Chohan
The Saturday schedule was due to see Alberta open against Manitoba, Saskatchewan were then to face British Columbia and the day was to close with British Columbia taking on Manitoba. Manitoba was due to open Sunday’s playing schedule against Saskatchewan, British Columbia and Alberta were then due to lock cricket bats and balls and the tournament was scheduled to close with the game between Alberta and Saskatchewan.
The British Columbia squad is listed on the Cricket BC website, as are the teams for the 2014 Jack Kyle Cup games between the Under-19 teams of British Columbia and Alberta that was due to take place on the weekend of April 26-26, 2014.
Cricket Canada Director Mike Sharma’s view about the Western T20 tournament was “The weekend is shaping up to be quite exciting” and he was “looking forward to some excellent cricket as the best talent from the Western Provinces will be on display”.
For those looking for some upcoming inter-provincial cricketing events, Cricket BC’s website provides a pointer to the Cricket Canada’s version of the Canada Cup for Under-17 teams. It is to take place in the Toronto area between June 30, 2014 and July 5, 2014. Participating teams are due to be Alberta, British Columbia, a combined Manitoba/Saskatchewan team, and two Ontario teams (A and B).
The Canada Cup U17 event will be played on a round-robin basis with a maximum of 50-overs per side, as in One Day International (ODI) cricket.
The eastern Canada’s Atlantic T20 tournament is also in the pipelines. It is due to be played at the Tea Hill ground, Stratford, Prince Edward Island on August 2-3, 2014. Celebrations of 150 years of confederation are taking place around the time the Atlantic T20 is scheduled.
It is hoped that confirmation about this year’s National Cricket League will be forthcoming in the near future.
Someone was kind and sensible enough to post some summary scores for the Western Canada T20 on the Cricket Canada website. Alberta scored 160/7 (20 ov) and beat Manitoba by 69 runs in the tournament’s opening game. British Columbia’s 139/7 (20 ov) was enough to see them beat Saskatchewan 130/8 (20 ov) by 9 runs on Saturday. On Sunday Saskatchewan posted 169/8 (20 ov) and beat Manitoba 139/9 (20 ov) by 30 runs, but Manitoba then bowled out British Columbia for 109 and squeezed to a two wickets win by scoring 110/8.
The Western Canada T20 scoring information on Cricket Canada’s facebook includes news about some individual contributions in these games. There may be further details on other websites and facebook pages for those with time to investigate.
It was interesting when searching the digital universe for news of the outcome of the MCC’s tour game against Alberta in 2012 to find that one website provided door-to-door instructions on how to travel by road from my home in Etobicoke, Ontario to the ground in Calgary, Alberta. The travel directions seemed reliable, but the website’s projected travel time of just over 8 hours for the home-to-ground journey seemed more than a touch unlikely.
Happy cricket trails! Keep your eyes on the ball, and the twittering websites and facebook pages
Eddie Norfolk