KARACHI: Defending champions Multan cruised to a five-wicket victory over hosts Karachi to qualify for the final of the 6th National Disabled T20 Cricket Champi­onship at RLCA Ground Gulberg here on Thursday.

In the first semi-final between winners of Group ‘A’ and Group ‘B’, Multan rode on Majid Hussain’s 43-ball innings of 57 (four fours and two sixes) to reach their target of 152 for the loss of five wickets with three balls to spare.

Karachi, who were sent into bat, made 151-8 with Rao Javed top scoring with 60 off 50 deliveries while striking six fours.

Later, chief guest Arshad Khan, PCB’s representative and senior general manager of National Stadium Karachi, gave away the man-of-the-match award to Multan’s Majid Hussain.

Multan’s opponents in the final to be played in Karachi will be decided next month when the twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad host the second phase of the eight-team tournament.

Result on Thursday:

First semi-final:

Multan beat Karachi by five wickets.

KARACHI 151-8 in 20 overs (Rao Javed 60, Mohammad Zeeshan 31, Ahmed Raza 17; Mohammad Haris 2-19, Jahanzaib Tiwana 2-36); MULTAN 152-5 in 19.3 overs (Majid Hussain 57, Zaman Ali 23, Jahanzaib Tiwana 22; Mohammad Zeeshan 3-33).

Results on Wednesday:

Bahawalpur beat Quetta by six wickets.

QUETTA 173-8 in 20 overs (Abdullah Khan 61 not out, Nusratullah 54; Gul Hasan 3-26); BAHAWALPUR 175-4 in 20 overs (Mohammad Shahzad 53, Mohammad Abid 44, Abdul Khaliq 32 not out; Nizamuddin 3-27).

Sargodha beat Hyderabad by six wickets.

HYDERABAD 148-6 in 20 overs (Hamza Hameed 89 not out, Mohammad Noman 33; Mohammad Akram 3-11, Saifullah 2-47); SARGODHA 152-4 in 13.1 overs (Ahsan Khalil 64 not out, Mohammad Zaheer 37).

Karachi beat Faisalabad by eight wickets.

FAISALABAD 175-9 in 20 overs (Rehan Ghani Mirza 59, Adnan Ali 45, Adnan Butt 38; Haroon Rasheed 3-34); KARACHI 176-2 in 19 overs (Arif Richard 92 not out, Danish Ahmed 38, Rao Javed 37).

Multan beat Quetta Bolan by nine wickets.

QUETTA BOLAN 129-8 in 18 overs (Umar Farooq 44, Zaheer Ahmed 33; Jahanzaib Tiwana 5-16); MULTAN 130-1 in 15.1 overs (Matloob Qureshi 76 not out, Zubair Saleem 27 not out, Majid Hussain 20).

Published in Dawn, January 5th, 2018