Nigeria’s under-19 Cricket Team, the “Junior Yellow Green”, on the 23rd of March 2019 booked the country’s first ever spot at the Cricket World Cup.
They achieved this feat after topping the week-long qualifying series that was concluded in Windhoek, Namibia. The team defeated Sierra Leone with two wickets on the final day of the Africa qualifying tournament.
Nigeria started on a bright note (having been left to field, in the first innings) with the bowling attack on point with Sierra Leone struggling to piece together a decent partnership.
However, it was Kamara Henry who tormented Nigeria’s bowlers and denied them vital points.
He raced to quick 50 runs off 60 balls, supported by T. Sancho with 24 runs off 50 balls and John Bangura 21 off 31 balls to help their team to a total of 138 runs all out in 37. 2 overs.
Mohamed Taiwo, Abdulrahman Jimoh, Peter Aho and Abolarin Rasheed all had two wickets each.
In the second innings, Sierra Leone deployed a bowling approach starting with the spin to ensure that they restricted the Nigeria Team to 20 runs for the loss of 1 wicket before lunch.
At the resumption of lunch, Sierra Leone struck with two more wickets to ensure that the Nigeria team worked hard for every run scored.
At 20 overs, Nigeria were 38 runs for three wickets with the game hanging in the balance.
Danladi Isaac struck 25 runs off 46 balls, and Miracle Ikaigbe 22 runs off 56 balls steadied the ship with a 47 runs partnership before Sierra Leone struck again with consecutive wickets to create a tension level.
At 91 runs for seven wickets, it was looking more like Sierra Leone would provide that punch that would sink the ship eventually.
The bowlers took their turns to impress with Emmanuel Boniface striking 11 runs off nine balls in the death, supported by Abdulrahman Jimoh with 12 runs off 12 balls not out.
Nigeria was 122 runs when that all-important wicket fell and well in sight of the finish line though in Cricket.
The top performer who showed class and courage amid trouble was Peter Aho with a remarkable 21 runs off 32 balls not out.
Nigeria survived in what could be described as the best performance in this tournament to record the required total of 139 runs for the loss of 8 wickets in 44.2 overs.
Peter Aho was named Man of the Match with his bowling and batting statistics of 2 wickets, and 21 runs Not out.
