Estonia v Guernsey
ICC T20 World Cup Sub Regional Europe Qualifier C, 2024
on Sunday 25th August 2024 at 3.30pm
at King George V Sports Ground, Castel, Guernsey
Match No. T20I no. 2809
Umpires: Anna Harris (ENG), Azam Baig (IRE)
Toss won by Guernsey who elected to field
Player of the match Harry Johnson (Gsy)

Estonia innings			Runs	Balls	4s	6s	SR		Guernsey Bowling	Ov	Mdn	Runs	Wkts	ECON
Arslan Amjad*	c Bichard	b Forshaw	2	7	0	0	28.57		Harry Johnson	4	0	18	3	4.5
Steffan Gooch	c Damarell	b Forshaw	7	15	1	0	46.67		Luke Bichard	4	1	6	2	1.5
Ali Masood		b Johnson	1	10	0	0	10		Charlie Forshaw	4	0	31	3	7.75
Bilal Masud	c Stokes	b Johnson	13	16	1	0	81.25		Adam Martel	3	0	12	0	4
Habib Khan	c T Nightingale	b Johnson	39	37	3	1	105.41		Martin Bradley	4	0	29	0	7.25
Sahil Chauhan	c Damarell	b Bichard	2	6	0	0	33.33		Matthew Stokes	1	0	3	0	3
David Robson	c Damarell	b Bichard	0	4	0	0	0
Stuart Hook+		b Forshaw	18	20	1	1	90
Pranay Gheewala	not out		7	3	0	0	233.33
Marko Vaik	not out		1	3	0	0	33.33
Aditya Paul	dnb
Extra	(w 8, b 0, lb 0, p 0, nb 1)		9
Total	(for 8 wkts)		99	(RR.4.95)
Fall of wickets	1-8 (Amjad 2.2 ov), 2-12 (Masood 4.2 ov), 3-18 (Gooch 5.4 ov), 4-42 (Masud 10.5 ov), 5-47 (Chauhan 12.1 ov), 6-47 (Robson 12.5 ov), 7-89 (Khan 18.4 ov), 8-92 (Hook 19.1 ov)

Guernsey innings			Runs	Balls	4s	6s	SR		Estonia Bowling	Ov	Mdn	Runs	Wkts	ECON
Josh Butler	c Vaik	b Khan	29	24	4	0	120.83		David Robson	4	0	16	1	4
Ben Fitchet	c Masud	b Robson	6	5	1	0	120		Steffan Gooch	2	0	25	0	12.5
Tom Nightingale		b Khan	34	16	4	2	212.5		Pranay Gheewala	1	0	16	0	16
Matthew Stokes	not out		18	16	3	0	112.5		Bilal Masud	1	0	13	0	13
Isaac Damarell +		b Chauhan	7	9	0	0	77.78		Habib Khan	3.1	0	24	2	7.58
Ollie Nightingale *	lbw	b Chauhan	0	1	0	0	0		Sahil Chauhan	1	0	6	2	6
Luke Bichard	not out		5	2	1	0	250
Adam Martel	dnb
Martin Dale Bradley	dnb
Charlie Forshaw	dnb
Harry Johnson	dnb
Extra	(w 1, b 0, lb 2, p 0, nb 0)		3
Total	(for 5 wkts in 12.1 ov)		102	(RR.8.38)
Fall of wickets	1-22 (Fitchet 2.4 ov), 2-66 (T Nightingale 6.4 ov), 3-79 (Butler 8.5 ov), 4-92 (Damarell 11.2 ov), 5-92 (O Nightingale 11.3 ov)

‘Sarnians close in on final’ by Gareth Le Prevost Guernsey Press
WHAT a response from Guernsey as they produced their Sunday best. If the hosts had briefly stalled against Finland in what might have been a very damaging defeat at Port Soif on Saturday, the following afternoon they engaged top gear again and gave a big crowd what they had arrived hoping to see as Estonia were outplayed from start to, very nearly, finish. The loss of a couple of wickets late on in the run chase with the hard work done might have taken some of the gloss off, but having dominated for the best part of 30 overs, a minor hiccup in the last couple can easily be overlooked, as Matt Stokes alluded to afterwards.

‘It was one of those where we knew that we’d won the game, but we wanted to try and win it as quickly as possible to give our net run-rate as big a boost as possible, so actually I didn’t really mind the wickets being lost,’ said the man who hitting the winning boundary. ‘We were trying to go for quick runs and me and Bish [Luke Bichard] said at the end, “You know what, let’s just get it over the line and move on to the next game”.’ In truth, the game had largely been won in the first six overs with a dangerous Estonian side reduced to 18 for 3 within the powerplay after Ollie Nightingale had chosen to bowl first, with his young seam attack doing the damage. The way the top-order batters played teenagers Harry Johnson and Charlie Forshaw was as if the Sarnian duo were a notch up on anything else they had faced this tournament in terms of pace while Luke Bichard was the epitome of control. It was Bichard, as a fielder, and Forshaw who combined for the first wicket as Arslan Amjad miscued to mid-on and then Ali Masood, who faced 10 balls for his solitary run, was beaten for pace by a pearler from Johnson.

A ripsnorter of a delivery from Forshaw accounted for Steffan Gooch and Guernsey were well on top. For the rest of the Estonian innings, the men in blue were left trying to nudge their way up to a respectable total while Guernsey turned the screw with more accurate bowling well backed up in the field. At the halfway stage the bat- ting side had only mustered 39 and then another cluster of wickets fell, sparked by Johnson inducing a mistimed pull from Bilal Masud to the safe hands of Stokes before Bichard got the wickets he deserved, both caught behind but two highly contrasting catches for Zak Damarell who took a skier to dismiss Shall Chauhan then a sharp one as Dave Robson top-edged an attempted hook. Habib Khan and Stuart Hook put on 42 for the seventh wicket to push their side towards three figures and there were a couple of lusty blows late on, but player-of-the-match Johnson and Forshaw returned to each claim a third wicket to keep Estonia below 100.

Any lingering anxiety from Guernsey’s batting performance the previous day was quickly alleviated as Ben Fitchet and Josh Butler hit three of the first eight balls of the reply to the boundary. Then, after Fitchet was early on a pull shot and caught at midwicket in the third over, Tom Nightingale got to work in the fourth as he sent a sweep, a pull shot and a cover drive all for fours. By the end of the powerplay he was clearing the ropes and Guernsey had already reached 65 for l. The introduction of the extra pace of Habib Khan, who became his country’s leading T20I wicket-taker during the match, ended Nightingale’s fun when he missed an attempted ramp and Butler fell to a top-edge in Khan’s next over. Stokes and Zak Damarell then got their side within eight of victory when Chauhan struck in successive deliveries to remove Guernsey’s wicketkeeper-batter and their captain. That left Bichard to see things through with Stokes, whose pick-up four to the leg-side boundary sealed the win with 47 balls to spare.

‘Sarnians beat Estonia to close in on final’ by Gareth Le Prevost Guernsey Press
Guernsey are in pole position to reach tomorrow’s ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Sub-Regional Europe Qualifier C final.
A big crowd turned out at the KGV on Sunday to see Guernsey win their crunch clash with Estonia. Thanks to their emphatic victory over the previously unbeaten Estonia on Sunday afternoon, the hosts sit top of group two on six points with a very healthy net run-rate having completed their round-robin programme with three wins from four matches.
Both Finland and Estonia can draw level with Guernsey on points if they beat Bulgaria and Malta respectively today at Port Soif, but they would have to win by big margins to overtake the Sarnians on NRR.
‘We wanted to make the final, that was our goal, and hopefully we’re in a good position to do that – and then it’s a one-off game against whoever we’re up against,’ said Guernsey all-rounder Matt Stokes soon after he had hit the winning runs against Estonia in front of a crowd of hundreds at the KGV.

The bowlers had already done a terrific job in restricting the Estonians to just 99 from their 20 overs after Guernsey captain Ollie Nightingale had inserted the opposition with Harry Johnson claiming the player-of-the-match award for his three wickets. Fellow teenager Charlie Forshaw also took three while Luke Bichard claimed two.
The run chase went largely to plan, too, and it was only in the batters’ haste to get the job done with the winning post in sight that they lost a couple of needless wickets, but Guernsey were still comfortable five-wicket winners with 47 balls to spare.

‘It was a proper attitude and a proper performance. I think we showed that from the first couple of overs and bowled tightly, bowled to our plans and constantly taking wickets,’ said Stokes.
‘I think if we’re being really critical, I reckon we could probably bowled them out for about 75 – they gave us a little bit more than we would have liked to have chased.
‘But then with the bat we’ve just said it to ourselves the whole season, just go out and be positive and just try and win it as quickly as possible.’ He added that Saturday’s narrow four-run defeat to Finland in that weather-affected shortened contest at Port Soif had not affected the positivity of the squad, who saw that performance more as a one-off.

Matt Stokes was at the crease as Guernsey reached their target with plenty to spare. This is the brand of cricket that we want to play,’ said Stokes, referring to the display against Estonia. ‘And I think that we showed that to everyone here that this is the standard of cricket that we play.’
A lot of people saw that intent, too, with hundreds in attendance. Guernsey hope that, if they are in tomorrow’s final, similar numbers will turn out again. ‘It’s awesome to have people down here that I haven’t actually seen down here before,’ Stokes said. ‘It gives us a lot of encouragement and when you hit one for four or when you take a catch or if you take a wicket you hear the crowd going and it gives you a bit of a boost.’

Group A	Matches	Won	Lost	No Result	Points	NRR
Guernsey	4	3	1	0	6	2.95
Finland	4	3	1	0	6	2.18
Estonia	4	3	1	0	6	-0.10
Malta	4	1	3	0	2	-0.58
Bulgaria	4	0	4	0	0	-3.98
Group B
Denmark	4	3	0	1	7	4.87
Spain	4	3	0	1	7	1.26
Czech	4	2	2	0	4	-0.37
Cyprus	4	1	3	0	2	-1.63
Greece	4	0	4	0	0	-2.88

Preview of the final against Denmark:

‘Home advantage could be vital as Greens face Denmark in final’ Guernsey Press
Guernsey will face Denmark in this afternoon’s ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Sub Regional Europe Qualifier C final at the KGV.
Tom Nightingale says Sunday’s crowd was ‘probably the biggest that any of the boys have played in front of’ and is hoping for more of the same today. Having already completed their round-robin matches with their crucial win over Estonia on Sunday, the Sarnians had an anxious wait to see whether Finland or Estonia could pull off a big-enough victory yesterday to overtake the hosts at the top of the group two table on net run-rate.
Estonia’s task against Malta was a virtually impossible one, while Finland were always unlikely to beat Bulgaria by enough and having set the latter 200 for victory, once the Finnish bowlers had conceded 20 runs in reply, Guernsey were through to today’s showpiece match. Tom Nightingale hopes the hosts will now rise to the occasion. ‘Every two years this kind of tournament happens, so you’ve just got to make the most of it and enjoy it. That’s how we’ve been going about our cricket all year, just enjoying it and that’s when we play our best cricket,’ said the Guernsey vice-captain, who added that confidence in the group is ‘very good’. ‘It’s going to be a good day hopefully. We’ve peaked at the right time – a big win on Sunday, played really well, everyone did their job and we’re just looking forward to the final.’
Denmark had to beat Cyprus yesterday to leapfrog Spain in group one and they did so convincingly at the KGV with the tournament’s leading run-scorer Hamid Shah making a brilliant 91 out of his side’s 205 for 4. The impressive Danish attack then restricted Cyprus to 63 for 9 to win by 142 runs. ‘They don’t seem to have had really any close games, which kind of probably benefits us to be honest, because obviously the Spain game that they had was rained off,’ said Nightingale in assessing Denmark. ‘Apart from that, they’ve just seemed to have dominated and not a lot of their batters seem to have had the opportunity to actually play and score some runs.
‘So they look similar to us really, just a really well-drilled side and they’ve played well obviously.’
Nightingale hopes that home advantage could make the difference in today’s final and has encouraged spectators to show their support for the team as they did on the weekend. ‘We had a good crowd on Sunday, a really big crowd, probably the biggest crowd that any of the boys have played in front of and we played really well,’ he said. ‘You never know when you have a crowd like that because some people aren’t used to it, but they’ve gone and played really well under pressure, so the support was good. ‘It’s always nice when you have lots of people around. Standing on the other side of the pitch when I was fielding [looking back towards the clubhouse], it’s like you’re playing in a County Championship match or a Blast game or something – it was really good.’

Spain set a new world record for most consecutive men’s T20I wins on Sunday – but they still missed out on reaching the final of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Sub Regional Europe Qualifier C. They have not lost an international T20 since November 2022 and they completed 14 wins in a row when they beat Greece by seven wickets in their final group match at Port Soif. Unfortunately their scheduled match against Denmark on Saturday was abandoned without a ball being bowled due to the weather and the Danes finished ahead of them in the group on net run-rate. Spain beat the record held by Malaysia and Bermuda, who racked up a streak of 13 successive wins in 2022 and 2021 respectively. Among the full-member nations Afghanistan and India hold the record with 12 back-to-back wins. The corresponding record in women’s T20Is is held by Thailand who had a winning streak of 17 games from 2018 to 2019.