Qatar Cricket Association president MA Shahid, Qatar Airways sales manager Ali Akbar Farabi and Qatar Olympic Committee’s Eisa Ali E Ghanem with the awardees and QCA officials.
The Qatar Cricket Association (QCA) honoured winners and standout performers of the Qatar Airways Cricket League Championship at the annual Gala Dinner at Hotel Gulf Paradise.
Qatar Airways, like the past years, supported the QCA National League this season and many brilliant performances marked the division A, B and C matches. The Division A title was won by Commercial Bank, while Galfar Al Misnad and HBK Club emerged as champions in divisions B and C respectively.
Qatar Airways sales manager Ali Akbar Farabi was the chief guest at the function and Qatar Olympic Committee’s Eisa Ali E Ghanem was the guest of honour.
Also present on the occasion were QCA president MA Shahid, QCA general secretary Manzoor Ahmad, head of Domestic Cricket Gul Mohamed Khan Jadoon, Chaudhry Mukhtar Ahmad, Mohamed Akram, Syed Hassan Raza, Mohamed Amjad Baig, Aminul Islam, Mohamed Asif Raza and Jamshaid Ahmad.
Farabi congratulated the champions of all three divisions and said that Qatar Airways would continue to help the QCA in boosting the game.
Shahid extended his deep gratitude to Qatar Airways for supporting cricket in Qatar. He also hoped that the partnership between Qatar Airways and the QCA would further prosper.
“The QCA is always grateful to the Qatar Olympic Committee and committed sponsors like Qatar Airways for their backing to cricket. We’re on the right track of growth and improvement,” said QCA general secretary Ahmad.
“The past season has been good for the game in Qatar. But we have to push harder to take the sport to higher reaches. In the next season, our targets would obviously be higher and it would be possible to achieve them only when we all work in unison,” he added.
Al Feroz bowler Hafiz Nadeem scalped 22 wickets in Division A, including three five-wicket hauls. Awais of Asian Club and Shihabuddin of Bangladesh Club had the distinction of securing seven wickets in two matches.
Five batsmen struck a century each in the Division A, including Mohamed Boota of Al Feroz, who had League-high 125 against Bangladesh Club. Other century-makers were Awais (Asian Club), Noman (Qatari Diar), Tanveer (Asian Club) and Sanka (Al Hanzab Club).
In Division B, Ali of Commercial Bank and Tariq Afridi of Khyber Club were the only ones to reach three-figure scores. Janaka of Garvey Lions dominated the bowling charts, claiming five or more wickets in a match twice.
Zubair of Al Khor stole the batting honours in Division C. The Al Khor player twice hammered a century, with 107 against AKCC Katara being his best knock. On six occasions, players got five wickets each and they were: Suresh (Qatar Super Kings), Mujtaba (Al Rayyan), Kamran (Mecton), Naushad (MTC), Mugheesh (HBK) and Abdul Rehman (Al Rayyan).
