Auckland beat Northern Districts to win the 2008/09 National Provincial A Tournament

Northern Districts won the toss and elected to field in the one-day final of the Provincial A Tournament. Auckland got off to a rollicking start with openers Jeet Raval and Colin de Grandhomme regularly finding the fence. Raval scored 61 off 48 balls and Colin de Grandhomme scored 28 off 13 balls. Dusan Hakaraia continued his fine form of the tournament with a hard hitting 88 runs off 56 balls including seven fours and two sixes before being dismissed off the last ball of the innings. Auckland had scored 202/4 off their 22 overs. All the Northern Districts bowlers were on the receiving end of the aggressive batting. Simon Andrews was the most successful of the Northern bowlers with 2/39 off his five overs.

Requiring a run rate of 9.18 Northern Districts started positively and the game was evenly poised until the 15 over mark. Captain Brad Wilson led from the front with a brilliant 100 off 68 balls including seven boundaries and three sixes. He put on 93 for the 2nd wicket with Cameron Merchant who scored 41 off 28 balls. Bhupinder Singh started bowling in the 15th over and that changed the course of the match. He took 5/28 off 4 overs which effectively ended Northern’s run chase. With wickets in hand and three overs to go they needed 40 runs, then 30 runs off 12 balls and 21 runs off 6 to win but kept losing wickets. Wilson was out off the first ball of the last over and with a new batsman at the crease the equation became too difficult with Auckland going on to win by 14 runs.

· Auckland 202/4 (Jeet Raval 61, Dusan Hakaraia 88) beat Northern Districts 188/6 (Brad Wilson 100, Cameron Merchant 41, Bhupinder Singh 5/28) by 14 runs