CLINICAL CLONTARF CRUISE PAST CIVIL SERVICE - IBI CORPORATE FINANCE PREMIER LEAGUE (APRIL 25TH)

The opening weekend of the IBI Corporate Finance Premier League saw the new boys in the league suffer a chastening defeat at the hands of an extremely professional Clontarf performance, as the Castle Avenue outfit swept Civil Service aside by 8 wickets, with new Overseas Player Sam Morgan the star of the show.

The day started ideally for Civil Service, as skipper Deepak Jayachandran won the toss and elected to bat first, however that was about as good as it got for quite a while for the home side, as a brace of wickets in Fionn Hand's opening over saw them reduced to 4/2, before his third wicket claimed Hedayat Khogiani, reducing Service to 19/3.

Jayachandran (17), Ankit Gusain (16) and Swaraj Batham (35) combined to take the score up to 104, before the biggest partnership of the innings between Zaman Safi and Mubasher Siddique (22) brought them to 175/7. Safi passed his 50 before being dismissed just one run later. An impressive final stand between Noor Ullah and Ramgokul Srinivasan added a further 34 and dragged their side to 215, however they left more than 12 overs unused. Hand's 3/27 saw him the pick of the bowlers, whilst there were two apiece for both Cillian McDonnell and Yash Bala.

'Tarf's chase got off to a quick start, as Séamus Lynch was in a typically aggressive mood, stroking 6 boundaries in his 25-ball 32, before being adjudged LBW off the bowling of Zaman Safi with the score on 42. Mitchell Thompson and Eoghan Delany added just 27 before the opener was dismissed for 17, with Delany joined at the crease by Sam Morgan.

The pair immediately accelerated, with Delany rotating the strike cleverly, as Morgan busily went about finding the boundary, showing a particular strength through point and straight down the ground. Service rotated through their full repertoire of bowling options, however the breakthrough was not forthcoming. As even a pause whilst umpire Willie Clarke dealt with the intrusion of a rogue drone couldn't stunt the concentration of Clontarf's middle order pair.

Morgan passed 50 just before drinks, and the hundred stand came up just a couple of overs later. Before something of a game of cat and mouse began with the scoreboard, or so the Clontarf fans thought at least, as talk of individual milestones grew. Morgan and Delany continued however, as neither showed any interest in reaching a half-century or century with the result still to be confirmed. This meant Morgan's final two boundaries saw him to an unbeaten 96, whilst Delany finished on 48, with the pair adding an excellent stand of 158 to guide their team to an 8 wicket win and 24 points.

Elsewhere, the chase of the day by a distance came just up the road in Phoenix, as the hosts were indebted to half-centuries for all-rounders Tyrone Kane and Raghav Grover in taking their total to 253/9 in 50 overs. For Cork County, there were '2-fors' for each of off-spinner Bakhtyar Nabi, skipper Diarmuid Carey, opener Thorne Prophet and debutant William Shields. The second innings however was almost unprecedented, as having lost Sunil Gautam for just 3 with the score on 51, opener Raj Undre and new overseas man Josh Hartill added 200 for the second wicket. Undre found the boundary 15 times and cleared it five more in his 136 from 122 deliveries, whilst Hartill managed ten fours and a six in his unbeaten 76. In a bizarre way, the Leesiders will have been disappointed not to claim full points, as Undre fell with just three needed to win, however an emphatic 8-wicket win will make it a happy trip back down the M8 this evening.

In Inch, another Australian was to the fore in North County's victory over Rush, as Lochie Hardy's 87-ball 105 included twelve fours and five maximums in guiding the hosts to 215 all out in 37.3 overs, amazingly the exact same top-line as Civil Service in our game of the day! A partnership of 70 with Alan Joseph Mathew (31) was the main boost to the innings, as when Hardy was dismissed as the sixth wicket, only 23 more runs were added, Nathan McGuire the pick of the Rush bowlers taking 4/34. The visitors could manage only 139 all out, as Isaac Bird was the only man to pass 20, making 66 of the first 106 runs before becoming the first of four victims to County debutant Husnain Maroof, as well as 3/29 from Hardy throttled the Kenure outfit to 139 all out.

In Observatory Lane, Balbriggan batted first, and in spite of the early loss of Emad Uddin and Cameron Rowe, saw contributions from Connor Fletcher (44) and Jordan Hollard (31) support a top-score of 78 from Chris de Freitas guide the team to 226 all out, yet another team however to bat first and leave more than 10 overs behind them. Bilal Azhar's 4/58 saw him the pick of the home bowlers, as Jai Moondra and Mark Tonge also took 3 and 2 wickets respectively. Leinster stuttered to 123/5, with their middle order of Monil Patel, Younas Ahmadzai and Joey Carroll all back in the hutch, however overseas man Tom O'Connor compiled an unbeaten 46 to guide them to a 3 wicket win with 61 balls to spare.

In The Village, Merrion batted first, and in spite of the top three contributing just three between them, were able to rebuild around an innings of 64 for Jamie Forbes, as he shared stands of 92 with Seb Dijkstra (38) and 55 with Sean Stanton (41) in corralling the team to 203 all out in their final over. Two wickets for each of Ravi Kumar, Mike Frost and Jeremy Martins doing the damage for the hosts. Malahide had made their way into a competitive position thanks to a Martins half-century, however an excellent spell of 3/28 for Oisin Bhoja, and two late wickets for Andy Doheny sealed a 44 run win for Merrion, with Malahide all out for just 159 in the chase.