Holland scored an emphatic seven-wicket victory over Fiji in the ICC
Trophy at the rain-soaked Ajax Stadium near Toronto Sunday
Latafat Ali Siddiqui03-Jul-2001Holland scored an emphatic seven-wicket victory over Fiji in the ICC
Trophy at the rain-soaked Ajax Stadium near Toronto Sunday.The match was reduced to 45 overs after heavy rains in the morning,
which delayed the start of play for more than one hour.In other matches, Bermuda defeated Papua New Guinea by nine wickets,
Malaysia handed Israel their third defeat, beating them by six wickets
and Nepal downed Gibraltar by three wickets with Argentina and Uganda
scoring identical six-run wins over France and East and Central Africa
respectively.With heavy winds blowing across the Ajax ground, Dutchmen put Fijians
into bat with their quickies doing excellent job to contain the rivals
to 127 in 44.2 overs.Holland suffered a setback in the beginning when they lost the wicket
of their prolific score Zulfiqar Ahmed for eight but Robert van
Oosterom (52) and Feiko Kloppenburg (40) batted fluently to guide
their team to victory.Nepal, who were late arrival in Toronto after a series of difficulties
in obtaining entry visas to Canada, overcame a poor start while
chasing a victory target of 134 at Malton ground near Pearson
International Airport.They had lost five wickets for 52 but Parash Luniya (36) and Kiran
Agarwal (26) batted with conviction to steer Nepal home.In another thrilling game, Argentina reached the victory target
against a plucky French side in the last over of the match.Batting first, Argentina scored 220 for five thanks to a fine knock of
57 by Marias Paterlini.In reply, Frenchmen looked like surpassing Argentina’s challenging
score, especially after the brilliant innings from Shabbir Hussain
(86), George James (46) and Simon Hewitt (38). But Argentina’s paceman
Hernan Pereyra picked up three quick wickets to shatter French hopes.
