On the fifth day of the ICC Under-19 World Cup 2022 being held in the West Indies, there was no surprise as firm favourites in all three encounters registered comfortable victories to move ahead in their respective groups.
In the first match of the day, England colts, who defeated defending champions Bangladesh in their first encounter of this World Cup, got the better of minnows Canada by a whopping margin of 106 runs. Batting first after being asked to by Toss winner Canada, England scored 320 courtesy of their skipper Tom Prest’s run a ball 93 and cities from George Bell and Gorge Thomas.
Chasing that was never going to be easy for Canada, but they did compete and went past the 200 mark before being eventually bowled out for 214 in the 49th over. Gurnek Singh Johal top-scored for the team with 44 off 40 balls. For England, Josh Boyden once again picked up a four-wicket haul to back up his four wickets against Bangladesh.
Though South Africa managed to win its match against fellow Africans in Uganda, their batting, which Neil Mackenzie, their batting consultant was talking about improving after the team failed to chase a modest total against India in the first game, didn’t seem to improve. The junior Proteas could only get up to 231-9 even against Uganda.
This also came after a century from Dewald Brevis who scored 104 out of the 231 runs. Thus, batting still remains a core component that the South African U-19 unit would have to work on. The bowling however was once again on the mark as they bowled out the Ugandan team for 110 in the 34th over itself.
Only three Uganda batters were able to get into the double digits and Isaac Ategeka top-scored with 29 off 72 balls.
In the last match of the day played at the Diego Martin Sporting Complex in Diego Martin, Trinidad, Afghanistan defeated Papua New Guinea by a huge margin of 135 runs even after themselves having scored only 200 runs. It wasn’t just one bowler, rather all bowlers contributed to Afghanistan’s domination.
In the first innings though, no Afghani batter was able to settle down as they were dismissed for 200 in the 39th over. Suliman Safi was the only Afghan batter to get past fifty as he scored 62 off 76 balls. Katenalaki Singi picked up four wickets for PNG.