The Money Gram-sponsored Cricket Ke Badshah T20 Tournament for the year 2015 under the auspices of Saudi Cricket Center (SCC) took off to a rousing start with 28 teams entered in three divisions.

The Premier Division attracted 10 teams as follows: ACE Travels, Caravan Travels, Tamer, Natco, Desert Warriors, Pak Green, Mazco, Panda and Arcoma Crown. The 12 Division-I morning league teams are: Eirad Travels, Pak Young, Al Khulais, Jamoom Fighters, ECU Lines, Ittehad, Blossom, Reel & Rom, Kashmir-XI, Al Boroj-XI, KAIA & M.B.Stars. In Division-II afternoon League six teams confirmed and a further two in the final stages of registration. Confirmed to participate are Saudi German Hospital, Peeran-XI, ICAD, Jeddah Shaheen, Peeran Warriors and Old Boys-XI. All told, Premier Division will have 10 teams, Division-I Morning league 12 and Division-II afternoon League 6 teams. Each division will play matches on a round robin league cum knockout format to decide the winner of each group. Div-I and Div-II champions will play against Premier Division winner to decide the JCA champion. The JCA champion will then proceed to the Champions League where 9 top teams from each of the Kingdom’s cricket associations will participate in a league cum knockout format to pick the MoneyGram Cricket Ke Badshah T20 champion of 2015. Jeddah Cricket Association (JCA) runs the tournament under the umbrella of SCC.

In the first week matches of JCA Premier Division, Natco beat Panda by 29 runs, Desert Warriors won comfortably against Pak Green-XI by a margin of 56 runs while Tamer got the walkover against Mazco which turned up late at the ground.

Thumping victory for Desert Warriors against Pak Green:

Batting first, Desert Warriors made 184-9 wickets in their allotted overs against Pak Green-XI. Junaid hit a magnificent knock of 78 runs in just 35 balls. He hit six fours and four huge sixes in his knock and his partner Jaffar made 54 runs. Waseem and Ashfaq made an identical 14 runs each to prop up the total. Asim Junior took 4 for 31, Moon had 3 for 45 and Imran 1 for 27. Pak Green-XI in reply slumped to a meager total of 128 all out and lost the match by a huge margin of 56 runs. Shan Malik Manzoor made 42 runs, Javaid 11 and Imran 15 helped Pak Green to three-figure mark while Adeel had 4 for 18. Mirza 2 for 10, Islam 2 for 25 and Baqer took 1 for 4 for Desert Warriors.

Natco beat Panda by 29 runs:

Batting first, Natco made 193 for 5 in 18 overs against Panda cricket team. Chand was the highest scorer at 74 runs including six boundaries and two huge sixes. His partner Mohammad Munawwar equally played well as he hit magnificent knock of 67 runs. Fahad 20 & Mustafa 9 not out also contributed runs for Natco. Yasir 1-24, Mustafa 1-30 & Karam Ali Khan had 1-37. In reply, Panda was bundled out for paltry 164 runs and lost the match by 29 runs. Their opening batsman Taher made 55 runs, Zafar 30 while Karam Ali Khan was unbeaten on 15 but none of the other batsmen reached double figure. Aijaz was the most successful bowler on 4-23, left arm spinner Ashique Ali had 2-18 and Mohammad Munawwar 2-36.