Meads Enforcers Win CPL9!

The conclusion of CPL9 was held on Sunday, three teams all vying for the pink bat: Grove Armada, Gogmore Knights in the Semi-final, and Meads Enforcers awaiting them in the Final. The Armada, fresh from their morning boat party, lost David Risk early, but between David Sloan and Adam Powlesland, who put on an 87-run partnership, they got the total moving, but past them things plateaued somewhat. Sloan went on, scoring our first CPL 100 of the season - and what a time to do it, off 56 balls too, making his tally 194 for the weekend. 183-6 at the end, and Gogmore Captain Raun Patil's batsmen set about the task, Cade Skelton 37 off 31, the curiously-named Zoysa 34 off 22, Joe Pipe, a Finals Day luxury for hire 40 off 26, Captain Patil 47 off 20. What a time to come together, the Armada's chances sunk, the Knights booking their place in the Final, and Zoysa doing a turn as a clairvoyant in the interval (probably - we made that bit up).

To the Final. Sadly the write up will probably be as short as the match, just 16.1 overs to settle things. The Knights elected to bat, and lost opener Skelton first ball. Not an ideal start. The Enforcers, fresher legs, set about whipping through the Knights' lineup, Ben Hanger (3-4), Gary Porter (3-8), and Luke Westcott (4-23) doing the damage, the Knights all out for just 62. The Bourne Stars' pirate ship showed their displeasure from afar, the reverberations felt across the ground. No more so than with Zeeshan Mehtab, in the mix of the side-hustle batting MVP competition, a place familiar for the past five years. He needed most of the runs on the board to get his first purple cap, but with a batting lineup so strong, it was going to be tricky. Be selfish was our advice, and he got 17 of the balls from the 40 it took to get the win, but ended about 15 short. So, a brutal end to CPL9, Meads Enforcers winning for the third time in their history, and a finals day throwing up more questions than answers. 

Side-hustle-wise David Sloan took the batting MVP with 143 runs, Jack Ogle the bowling for the second time in a row with 8 wickets. We had a new leader in the Fantasy League - Vishnu Remesh's Subway Surfers take the crown, winning by just 10 points.