Akhtar century sinks Vikings

Sohail Akthtar batted with supreme confidence, hitting a magnificent century to get the better of an experienced Yorkshire side

Lahore Qalandars overcame a sloppy effort in the field to chase down 185 and beat Yorkshire by six wickets.

Sohail Akthtar batted with supreme confidence, hitting a magnificent century to get the better of an experienced Vikings side.

Akhtar and Salman Irshad put on an exhibition of power hitting in a second-wicket partnership of 70 to break the back of the chase.

Irshad fell for 30 but Akhtar took the Yorkshire bowlers apart to steer his side to a confidence-boosting victory.

Having lost the toss and being inserted, Steven Patterson's team - aided by some poor fielding - posted a competitive 184 on a track that earlier saw Boost Defenders score 205.

There were partnerships of fifty or more between Harry Brook (37) and Adam Lyth (32), as well as Gary Ballance (33) and Jonny Tattersall (26) but no Yorkshire batsman could push on in the manner of Akhtar.

Tom Kohler-Cadmore fell third ball to the spin of Muhammad Babar before Brook and Lyth got Yorkshire’s innings on the right track.

Brook in particular looked in ominous form - hitting Ali Majid to all parts with some high-class strokeplay.

His explosive effort came to an end, caught off the bowling of Shaheen Afridi. Brook is a player who promises much in the game.

Lyth, reverse sweeping against the spin of Raja, was plumb lbw leaving Yorkshire 80 for 3, followed by Tattersall giving Raja his second scalp, sweeping and being bowled by a straight one.

After Ballance chopped on to Shaheen, Jack Leaning (26*) and Tim Bresnan (17*) pushed Yorkshire on to what looked a decent total, but Akhtar had other ideas.

Bresnan struck with his second ball to remove Imran Nazir but gave up 17 in his second over as Akhtar and Irshad began to break loose.

Josh Poysden had Irshad caught at long-on and looked to have the key wicket of the captain before controversially being denied by the umpires.

Yorkshire thought they had their man as Akhtar, 51 not out, looked to have fallen to a piece of excellence by Lyth on the boundary.

Akhtar was walking off the field before being called back, with Lyth deemed to have got some boot on the boundary rope. Six runs given.

Poysden bowled Mohammad Faizan and Akhtar was finally sent on his way for 100 by Bresnan but that damage had already been done with Sussex’s Phil Salt (37*) clobbering a six over mid-off to win the match.

Yorkshire skipper Patterson said: “We were confident with the runs we had, probably didn’t execute with the ball as we would have liked and didn’t get the rub of the green maybe.”