International cricket tournament
Cricket tournament
The 2021 Valletta Cup was a Twenty20 International (T20I) cricket tournament held in Malta between 21 and 24 October 2021.[ 1] It was the second edition of the Valletta Cup . The matches were played at the Marsa Sports Club in Marsa .[ 2] The participating teams were the hosts Malta along with Bulgaria , Gibraltar and Switzerland .[ 1]
This was the first international tournament for Switzerland since the introduction of global T20I status in January 2019,[ 3] and their re-admittance to the International Cricket Council (ICC) in July 2021.[ 1] Cricket Switzerland (previously known as the Swiss Cricket Association), had been suspended by the ICC in 2012 due to non-compliance following the formation of a second organization also claiming to oversee cricket in the country.[ 4] They were one of three nations to gain Associate membership after the ICC's annual general meeting in July 2021.[ 5] [ 6]
Switzerland finished on top of the round-robin stage with three wins.[ 7] Malta defeated Switzerland in the final,[ 8] after Bulgaria defeated Gibraltar in the third-place playoff.[ 9] After the tournament, Malta and Gibraltar played a rain-affected two-match bilateral T20I series that was shared after one game was lost to the weather and the other finished as a DLS method tie.[ 10]
Squads
Bulgaria
Gibraltar [ 11]
Malta
Switzerland [ 1]
Prakash Mishra (c )
Hristo Lakov (vc )
Atagul Ahmadhel
Jacob Albin
Sulaiman Ali
Rohan Bhavesh Patel
Kevin D'Souza
Aravinda De Silva
Akshay Harikumar
Saim Hussain (wk )
Ivaylo Katzarski
Ahsan Khan
Andrey Lilov
Omar Rassol (wk )
Bakhtiar Tahiri
Delrick Varghese
Avinash Pai (c )
Nikhil Advani
Louis Bruce
Luke Collado (wk )
Richard Cunningham
Chris Delany
Kieron Ferrary (wk )
James Fitzgerald
Charles Harrison
Patrick Hatchman
Joseph Marples (wk )
Kenroy Nestor
Morgan Peters
Philip Raikes
Andrew Reyes
Dave Robeson
Joe Wilson
Bikram Arora (c )
Amar Sharma (vc )
Waseem Abbas
Samuel Aquilina (wk )
Gopal Chaturvedi
Basil George
Heinrich Gericke
Aaftab Alam Khan (wk )
Zeeshan Khan
Niraj Khanna
Kalki Kumar
Zoheb Malek
Bilal Muhammad
Fazil Rahman
Samuel Stanislaus
Varun Thamotharam
Jojo Thomas
Deon Vosloo
Anser Mehmood (c )
Nicolas Henderson (wk )
Noorkhan Ahmedi
Aidan Andrews
Stefan Franklin
Aneesh Kumar
Asvin Lakkaraju
Asad Mahmood
Osama Mahmood
Matthew Martin
Ali Nayyer
Idrees Ul Haque
Arjun Vinod
Ashwin Vinod
Valletta Cup
Points table
Fixtures
v
Heinrich Gericke 64 (25) Avinash Pai 2/28 (4 overs)
Louis Bruce 57* (55) Bilal Muhammad 1/24 (4 overs)
Malta won by 61 runs Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: Andrew Naudi (Mlt) and Tim Wheeler (Mlt) Player of the match: Heinrich Gericke (Mlt)
Malta won the toss and elected to bat.
Aaftab Alam Khan, Kalki Kumar (Mlt), Philip Raikes and Andrew Reyes (Gib) all made their T20I debuts.
v
Louis Bruce 31 (27) Aidan Andrews 3/21 (4 overs)
Osama Mahmood 58* (46) Charles Harrison 1/19 (2 overs)
Switzerland won by 9 wickets Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: Tony Slater (Mlt) and Tim Wheeler (Mlt) Player of the match: Osama Mahmood (Sui)
Gibraltar won the toss and elected to bat.
Noorkhan Ahmedi, Aidan Andrews, Stefan Franklin, Nicolas Henderson, Asad Mahmood, Osama Mahmood, Anser Mehmood, Ali Nayyer, Idrees Ul Haque, Arjun Vinod and Ashwin Vinod (Sui) all made their T20I debuts.
v
Jacob Albin 19* (30) Aneesh Kumar 3/3 (2.3 overs)
Arjun Vinod 43* (20) Delrick Varghese 1/21 (1 over)
Switzerland won by 8 wickets Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: Ghose Roy (Mlt) and Tony Slater (Mlt) Player of the match: Aneesh Kumar (Sui)
Bulgaria won the toss and elected to bat.
Ahsan Khan, Andrey Lilov (Bul) and Aneesh Kumar (Sui) all made their T20I debuts.
v
Avinash Pai 107* (52) Sulaiman Ali 2/38 (4 overs)
Hristo Lakov 80 (63) James Fitzgerald 2/37 (4 overs)
Gibraltar won by 37 runs Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: Ashok Bishnoi (Mlt) and John Grima (Mlt) Player of the match: Avinash Pai (Gib)
Bulgaria won the toss and elected to field.
Dave Robeson (Gib) made his T20I debut.
Avinash Pai became the first player for Gibraltar to score a century in T20Is.[ 13]
v
Asad Mahmood 33 (25) Bikram Arora 3/20 (4 overs)
Bilal Muhammad 35* (17) Ashwin Vinod 3/30 (4 overs)
Switzerland won by 8 runs Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: John Grima (Mlt) and Ghose Roy (Mlt) Player of the match: Osama Mahmood (Sui)
Switzerland won the toss and elected to bat.
Matthew Martin (Sui) made his T20I debut.
v
Omar Rassol 63* (36) Varun Thamotharam 2/30 (4 overs)
Basil George 41 (27) Sulaiman Ali 2/26 (3 overs)
Malta won by 6 wickets Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: Jitesh Patel (Mlt) and Ghose Roy (Mlt) Player of the match: Heinrich Gericke (Mlt)
Bulgaria won the toss and elected to bat.
Zoheb Malek and Deon Vosloo (Mlt) both made their T20I debuts.
Third-place play-off
v
Avinash Pai 71 (37) Prakash Mishra 3/22 (4 overs)
Aravinda De Silva 62 (40) Charles Harrison 2/31 (4 overs)
Bulgaria won by 6 wickets Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: Jitesh Patel (Mlt) and Ghose Roy (Mlt) Player of the match: Hristo Lakov (Bul)
Gibraltar won the toss and elected to bat.
Final
v
Bikram Arora 42 (39) Aneesh Kumar 2/26 (4 overs)
Idrees Ul Haque 42 (23) Varun Thamotharam 3/25 (4 overs)
Malta won by 6 runs Marsa Sports Club , Marsa Umpires: John Grima (Mlt) and Jitesh Patel (Mlt) Player of the match: Varun Thamotharam (Mlt)
Malta won the toss and elected to bat.
Bilateral series
Gibraltarian cricket team in Malta in 2021–22
Malta
Gibraltar Date
25 October 2021 Captains
Bikram Arora
Avinash Pai Results
2-match series drawn 0–0 Most runs
Varun Thamotharam (50)
Kieron Ferrary (35) Most wickets
Waseem Abbas (1) Bilal Muhammad (1)
Louis Bruce (4)
1st T20I
No toss.
No play was possible due to rain.
2nd T20I
v
Varun Thamotharam 50 (27) Louis Bruce 4/13 (3 overs)
Kieron Ferrary 35* (25) Waseem Abbas 1/15 (2 overs)
Gibraltar won the toss and elected to field.
No further play was possible due to rain. Gibraltar had been set a revised target of 98 runs from 12 overs.
Jojo Thomas (Mlt) and Kieron Ferrary (Gib) both made their T20I debuts.
References
External links
September 2021 October 2021 November 2021 December 2021 January 2022 February 2022 March 2022 April 2022 Ongoing