•The 19-year-old Gandhi shared what is Kenya’s highest wicket stand of 110 in over two years with Irfan Karim
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The two gave Kenya a dream start by getting Kenya to 31 in just four overs before adding on 19 at the end of the power play.
Image: FILE
Aman Gandhi announced his arrival on the big stage with a half-century as Kenyans enhanced their chances of qualifying for play-off with a seven-wicket win over Singapore yesterday.
Chasing 157 for 9, Kenya wrapped up their second win of the ICC Twenty20 qualifying event with seven balls to spare, thanks to a resilient knock from Gandhi who was playing his first match of the event after being overlooked at the expense of the under-performing Alex Obanda.
With the win, Kenya climbed to fourth place with four points from four matches. The Kenyans are set to play the much-improved Namibia and second-placed Papua New Guinea in their remaining matches.
The 19-year-old Gandhi shared what is Kenya’s highest wicket stand of 110 in over two years with Irfan Karim. Gandhi hit four boundaries and a six from 46 balls to score a match-winning 50. The two gave Kenya a dream start by getting Kenya to 31 in just four overs before adding on 19 at the end of the power play.
Karim was equally in a class of his own, posting 26 off 17 balls with Gandhi having posted 22 from 19. At this point, Kenya were way ahead of the run rate and never looked to relent on getting the scoreboard ticking. Karim was the first one to reach 50 in the 12th over off 32 balls before Gandhi made his maiden half-ton in the 14th over.
The stand was broken off the first ball of the 15th over when Amjad Mahboob had Gandhi caught. Dhiren Gondaria could only add on 21 for the second wicket before he was run out on 12. Collins Obuya too fell quickly but not before sending two balls out of the park. Karim remained unbeaten on 71 from 50 balls that included eight boundaries.
Earlier, skipper Shem Obado and Elijah Otieno had given Kenya a good start when they reduced the tournament’s ‘giant-killers’ to 4 for 1 and 36 for 2 in the first five overs. The Asian side managed to get a footing in their inning with a third-wicket stand between Surandram Chandramohan (40) and Tim David (29) that got their scores to 92 after 12.2 overs. This came off some bowling changes that seemed to favour the Singapore batsmen.
Even after Ngoche broke the stand by bagging his second wicket by dismissing Chandramohan, David got a hand from Aritra Dutta (33) which helped them to 147 for 5. From their own, they kept on losing wickets with Lucas Oluoch picking up three wickets and Elijah Otieno and Nelson Odhiambo adding on two more wickets.