The on-going National Men’s Cricket Championship has entered a feverish pitch as Semi-Final Matches get underway with battle line draws between Lagos and Kaduna on Monday in Benin.
Both teams, boasts of truckloads of players with national caps under their belt and are both nursing sores from their last match defeats in the preliminaries. The uncanny similarities in the matches they both lost was that it happened in the last over.
While Lagos seem to have rested four after losing to a youthful Edo side on Wednesday, Kaduna is coming to Monday match under the weight of being handed a defeat by Oyo with the last ball on Saturday.
The ODI series (fifty overs) that the matches assume from the Semi final leaves room for a new look and different approach.
For starters, the Kaduna team will field the National U-19 Captain Sylvester Ameh Okpe as its Captain while the Lagos team will field the past and current National Captain (Ademola Onikoyi and Joshua Ayannike) of the Men’s team.
The Kaduna’s team will also field Jimoh Mohammed, Daniel Gim, Gershon Yusuf, Simeon Samson, Danladi Isaac and Joel Tabat Joseph who have all played for the country. On the Lagos’ team list, Leke Oyede, Mustapha Yussuff, Femi Oduyebo, Sesan Adedeji, Taiwo Mohammed, Mohammed Moshood and Ayinde Tunde will all have put their reputation at stake for the epic match.
“These are two teams with experience on their sides as against the two other Semi finalists, Oyo and Edo” says Uyi Akpata the Vice President of the Nigeria Cricket Federation.
“This makes this match one to watch. We will have a number of our technical team members on the sidelines to see these player’s performance and we hope we hope that they won’t disappoint their state and hence give us cause to cheer.” He adds.
The second Semi final match will against Oyo and Edo States on Tuesday, March 30, while the winner of each match will lock horns for a final on Wednesday March 31st.
