The North West Seeff Dragons have staked their claim as one of the new favourites for the 2016 Africa T20 Cup title after maintaining a 100 per cent winning record in Pool A.

The Dragons played all their pool matches at the Pietermaritzburg Oval in Pietermaritzburg and beat KZN Inland, Namibia and Western Province along the way.

They first took on KZN Inland in their opening match on Friday 2 September and made 160/4 batting second, largely thanks to Rassie van der Dussen’s 31 and Janneman Malan’s 47 to cruise to a six-wicket victory. North West’s star performers in restricting KZN Inland were Bjorn Fortuin and Johannes Diseko, whose left arm spin bowling kept things tight.

North West’s next match was against Namibia and was almost a repeat of what happened against KZN Inland. North West was once again miserly with the ball in hand and brilliant in the field as they kept Namibia to a low score of 132/8. The new recruit, Ayavuya Myoli had a great day with the ball and picked up 3/20 in four overs. Myoli earlier left the field with a knee injury, but returned to bowl through the pain and was greatly rewarded for his perseverance.

Van der Dussen and Malan started the Dragons’ chase like a house on fire, slaying balls to the boundary at will. Their opening partnership was crucial in giving the Dragons their win. Despite a difficult middle period, they were able to pull the win through as Kagiso Rapulana and Lesego Senokwane combined to steer the team to a four-wicket victory.

The third and final match saw North West at their very best with a pummeling 64-run win against Western Province. The Dragons batted first for the first time in the tournament and needed to stamp their authority with a big total. Needless to say, Malan and Van der Dussen did that again, with Malan seizing the opportunity with a fine 70 from 48 balls that included seven fours and three sixes. Wihan Lubbe also contributed 37 from 31 balls to take the Dragons to a very competitive 191/3.

Western Province, though, had no reply for North West’s spin trio of Senokwane (3/18), Fortuin (2/18) and Diseko (2/29) who bamboozled the men from Newlands at will. The always dependable medium pace of Brady Barends also accounted for two crucial wickets early on.

“The guys really played fantastic cricket and I am very proud of the team. The Africa T20 Cup this year is played with a white ball which is more traditional than the pink ball used last year. I enjoyed playing with the white ball much more,” Dragons captain, Nicky van den Bergh stated.

Van den Bergh also feels that the scheduling of matches helped his team to stay fresh for the duration of the pool matches.

“There was only two games per day this year, instead of multiple matches for teams on one day,” he explained.

The semi-finals will start on 30 September 2016, giving the Dragons enough time to relax and prepare both mentally and physically for the knockout games.