The Warriors from the Eastern Cape will play in the final of the domestic Momentum One-Day Cup on Friday, after they beat the Titans convincingly by eight wickets at SuperSport Park on Tuesday night in the semi-final of the tournament.

Just like in the local T20 competition, the Titans have dominated the Momentum One-Day Series this season. But on Tuesday night, Albie Morkel and his men were completely overshadowed by a highly motivated Warriors team who clearly wanted revenge on the great defeat they suffered against the Titans last season in the final of this tournament.

Warriors captain Jon-Jon Smuts won the toss and sent the home team in to bat first. Henry Davids (19) and Tony de Zorzi (27) started slow, but they eventually scored 47 runs for the first wicket before the last mentioned was caught by Andrew Birch from his own bowling.

Then the wickets unfortunately fell too often and none of the top five batsmen could dig in their heels to at least get to 30 runs. Farhaan Behardien, who came in at number six, top scored with 57 off 67 balls, but he unfortunately ran out of partners who could keep the score board ticking with him.

Behardien and Junior Dala recorded a new 9^th wicket partnership record of 51 runs for the Titans, but although Dala (7) did his job perfectly, he was just a silent partner who had to block every ball or try to get the odd single to return the strike to Behardien. This resulted in a very slow run rate at a stage when the Titans should have chased the runs for a bigger total.

The Titans was bowled out in the last over for 230 and it was clear that the defending champions needed a small miracle to win the game.

After the Titans struggled during their innings there were some speculation around SuperSport Park that the pitch favoured the bowlers. Gihahan Cloete (56) and Lesiba Ngoepe (69), opening batsmen of the Warriors, have proven it wrong soon when they started chasing the runs at a comfortable pace.

Their partnership of 115 runs was eventually ended in the 18^th over when Cloete was caught by Behardien form the bowling of Klaassen. Ngoepe departed four overs later (caught by Morkel, bowled by Malusi Siboto) but that did not stop the momentum of the visitors from the Eastern Cape.

Captain Jon-Jon Smuts (74) continued his colleagues’ work and together with Yaseen Vallie (25) he built a partnership of 77 runs for the third wicket. That was enough to win the game when the passed the target in the 40^th over.

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