Zimbabwe Season : 1994-95 - Review

Zimbabwe Season 1994/95

John Ward

Remarkably, all matches played in the Logan Cup ended in outright
results,  with  the exception of the league match between the two
urban Mashonaland sides which was abandoned without a ball  being
bowled   owing   to  a waterlogged outfield.  It had been planned
to play the match at a later date, as the loss of one match   out
of  three   could   have   been  grossly  disadvantageous to both
partici- pants, but, when these two teams topped the  league  and
were   thus  to  meet  in the final anyway, a rescheduling of the
original match was unnecessary.

Again, many matches were played  without  the  degree  of  `edge`
desirable in a competition, and the batsmen in particular did not
seem to `switch on` until the first innings  were complete.   The
third  round,  played  after the Pakistani tour, saw a deplorable
situation where all four teams had great difficulty in making  up
numbers, as so many regular players, mainly those below Test lev-
el, declined to make themselves available. In the end, 18 out  of
the   44  players participating  in  that round were making their
first-class debut and most were clearly not yet of that standard.

Matabeleland were less successful this  season,  while  Districts
again   suffered  severely  from  the  unavailability of  farmers
throughout the competition. Mashonaland, it seemed, had   learned
from  their  complacency  of  the previous season and played with
greater determination. In the final they carried  too  many   big
guns for their Under-24 rivals.

Source :: ACS Publication `Zimbabwe first-class Matches 1994/95`

 Contributed by Peter.Griffiths (pete@cricinfo.com)