Cricket: Scots blown away in Namibian storm

The Saltires went into the second match of their campaign in good spirits following their opening day win over Kenya.

However, they met an irrepressible Namibian outfit who were still flying high in the wake of their surprise success against Ireland.

The men from Windhoek must now be seen as genuine qualification contenders after Louis van der Westhuizen’s spectacular century helped them post 192-3 en route to victory by a convincing 49 runs.

In a format of notoriously small margins, this was something of a rout.

Yet, briefly the Saltires, who had achieved a 4-1 series success over yesterday’s opponents in October, looked as if they might produce a remarkable run-chase.

They came flying out of the blocks in now customary fashion with Richie Berrington and Calum MacLeod taking the tally to 38-0 from four overs in line with the required rate.

However, MacLeod’s departure in the fifth over proved the beginning of the end. Berrington, having stroked five boundaries in a 22-ball 31, went four runs later and his tally was to be the best any Scottish batsman could muster on a day when they were out-gunned with both bat and ball.

It was a measure of the Namibians’ dominance that, while they helped themselves to a total of 11 sixes, the Saltires could not manage one between them as they dribbled towards a limp 143-8 at the close.

Coach Pete Steindl admitted: “It wasn’t pretty out there and we have to accept that we were totally outplayed.

“Our bowlers didn’t put the ball in the right areas consistently enough and any time we seemed to be getting a measure of control we put the ball back in their scoring areas.

“We were up against it when we went out to bat but we would still have backed ourselves to make a decent fist of the run-chase.

“But we needed one of our top order to bat through like van der Westhuizen did and that didn’t happen.”

Earlier, the Scots were given early cheer when Safyaan Sharif ripped through the defences to bowl the experienced Gerrie Snyman.

Snyman may be one of Namibia’s most prolific batsmen in all forms of the game but he is not their only danger-man as his team-mates went on to demonstrate.

At 6-1 in the second over, the Africans had work to do but it was nine overs and 86 runs later before the Saltires struck again.

Ray van Schoor was the man to go, trapped in front by Gordon Drummond, but he had contributed a useful run-a-ball 30 while allowing van der Westhuizen to move through the gears.

The centurian had another profitable partnership with skipper Craig Williams who hit two maximums in a rapid 30.

Williams was eventually caught by Berrington off Gordon Goudie but van der Westhuizen proved unstoppable.

The 23 year-old left-hander found a variety of shots with which to punish the Saltires bowlers on his way to an astonishing century.

His eight boundaries were harsh enough but van der Westhuizen matched that tally in sixes.

Two of them came from successive deliveries from the unfortunate Berrington to hoist the three figures.

In his first three overs, Berrington had restricted the Namibians to just 18 runs and fully merited his captain’s confidence when he was thrown the ball to deliver the final six balls of the innings.

The experiment failed, though, when van der Westhuizen and Nicholaas Scholtz embellished the Africans’ innings by adding a further 19 runs.

Van der Westhuizen finished unbeaten on 106, having faced just 54 deliveries, while Namibia’s total of 192-3 meant Scotland needed something extraordinary.

Alas, they were unable to deliver.

Steindl’s men will attempt to get their campaign back on track today when they face a Ugandan team who have won their opening two games.

The coach added: “The nature of T20 means that if you have a poor day you’ll get hurt.

“That’s what happened today and we must make sure it doesn’t happen again.

“We have areas to address and in particular the bowlers must execute their skills better.”