Composure was the key difference between Canada, a veteran of four cricket world cups, and a team of players who were drawn from local SCottish leagues who have never played a game together before. But right from the start it was the former associate heavyweights who were the ones who looked all at sea.
After winning the toss and choosing to bat Canada were in rough seas immediately as Klaassen had Gunaesekara caught and bowled off the very first ball of the match after the batsman popped a low full toss straight back to the bowler. Then five balls later Klaassen clean bowled Cheema to have the Canadians reeling at 2/6.
Kumar and Patel forming a great partnership for Canada. Not just steadying the ship but propelling the score along at a good rate. The 50 was brought up after the six over power-play and their 50 partnership breezed on easily too.
Both players played some lovely shots with Kumar being the more aggressive of the two bringing up his 50 off 30 balls and ending his innings with the Canadian high score of 68 off 38 balls. But with his demise went the Canadian innings as Patel was unable to gather any support from the rest of the batting line up and from a solid platform of 2/108 after 13.5 overs Canada were all out for 146 off the last ball of their 20 overs.
In reply Western District exerted complete control of the situation thanks mainly to Bredenkamp who scored with some strong shots to all parts of the ground. He attacked anything wayward and send it to the boundary with ease. He did have some luck as he picked out the man at deep square leg before the fielder lost it in the clouds and ended up taking evasive action to miss the chance. Bredenkamp fell into the trap again a few overs later and hit it straight to deep square leg where Gunasekera managed to keep track of it and take a clean diving catch and get the much needed breakthrough.
No panic in the Western Districts squad or batting innings and they kept pace while they made batting look easy. Canada tried every bowler they could searching for another wicket but without any real chance of a wicket. Scoring was in cruise control for WDCU as Qasim Sheikh and Brad Williams continued untroubled on their way to victory.
There was a consolation wicket to Canada as Sheikh was stumped of the bowling of Siddiqui in the 17th over but by then the result was a foregone conclusion as WDCU went on to claim a very composed victory with 8 wickets in hand and 9 balls to spare.
Canada looked ineffective in almost everything they did today and this must really have hurt their confidence of the once great associate nation. Their true test of character will be how they bounce back from this defeat, or if they really are on a capsizing vessel.