NZISA Victorious Against ND Maori

The NZISA cricket representative fixture against the Northern Districts Maori cricket team was played on Saturday 30th March at Seddon Park in Hamilton.

It has been a long time since NZISA has had the opportunity to play a representative cricket match, and NZISA selected an experienced team which saw the game played with some memorable performances.

Batting first NZISA made 310/8 after 50 over's. Best figures of the innings were Bharat Popli making 132 and Sandeep Patel making 64, with Northern Districts’ N. Gibson 2/57. NZISA restricted Northern Districts to 102 all out in the 30th over with the highest run scorer Jake Gibson with 57 and Ajaz Patel taking 4/19, with NZISA winning by 208 runs.

The event concluded with dinner where all attendees had a great time. The evening also saw a number of great raffle prizes sold where proceeds, which totaled $1285, were donated to the Christchurch Mayoral Fund supporting the victims of the Christchurch terror attack.

NZISA would like to thank the following for their organisation, support and sponsorship to help to get this fixture hosted to such a high level:

• NZISA delegates Praful Morarji (Bay of Plenty Indian Sports Club) and Vinod Patel (Auckland Indian Sports Club) for organising the event and creating a quality team.

• All NZISA players: Aniket Parikh; Ajay Kumar; Ajaz Patel; Anish Desai; Anurag Verma; Ash Vodnala; Bharat Popli; Kamal Bains; Lavi Sandhu; Navin Patel; Prasant Dhanjee; Raj Majithia and Sandeep Patel.

• Dipak Patel for providing his time and skills as Coach.

• Richard Kane from Paladin Sports who supplied the great NZISA uniforms and donating the shirts to our players.

• Jayshree Keshvara and Tara Patel (Waikato Indian Sports Club) for organising dinner for the evening function.

• Sponsors: Freedom 2 Play (sports gift vouchers), Visique Rose Optometrists Hamilton (Ray Ban sunglasses), Rototuna New World Hamilton (glass encased signed cricket bat), and Jeet Raval and Ajaz Patel (cricket shirts and back pack).

• All players and management from the Northern Districts Maori cricket team who were great opponents, and who we look forward to future fixtures against them.

Overall this event was highly successful and provides great promise in seeing this fixture become a regular event.

Result

NZISA won by 208 runs.

Most Valuable Players: Bharat Popli (NZISA), Jake Gibson (ND Maori).