Cricket: Edo, Lagos Make Men’s Championship Semi-Finals

Lagos and Edo States produced a good show of cricket in the closing match of Pool A at the National Men’s Championship in Benin City with the hosts state beating their star-studded opponent with four runs.

The win also ended the unbeaten run of Lagos State at the tournament.

Despite the Loss, Lagos still lead the group leaving Edo to second place while dashing the hopes of Anambra who had earlier in the day shoved Kwara aside hoping to ride on Edo’s defeat to the semi-finals. Both teams are now out of the tournament.

Uthe Ogbimi, National U-19 Coach who is also working closely with the Head Coach at the event praised the resilience of team Edo.

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“I think the two teams that qualified justified their place in the semis though both teams showed some level of vulnerability that I believe they should go back and address as the game progresses to the 50 over round,” he said.

Meanwhile, the four teams in pool B, Rivers, Ebonyi, Kaduna, and Oyo will take to the Turf Wickets for their preliminaries from Thursday, March 25 through Saturday, March 27 at the Edo Boys High School in Benin City.

Kaduna and Rivers will open the rounds for the group by 9:30 am while Ebonyi, a last-minute call up to replace Delta State that pulled out of the event and Oyo State will clash later today.

Enesi Habeeb, the Technical Director of the Nigeria Cricket Federation said the event has lived up to its billing as most of the players at the event have widened the national teams’ considerations through their show the Championship.

“This event is living up to what we hope it would achieve for us in team selection and technical details. It’s obvious we have a lot of work to do and I believe the National Head Coach, Asanka Gurusinha who is also on the ground has his notes full”.

The Championship has a major objective to develop cricket in Nigeria and will be concluded by March 31st.