Eagles back in action soon 

After their exit from the T20 World Cup, the FNB Namibia Eagles will be back in action soon when they host Uganda, Scotland and Oman over the next few weeks.

Uganda arrive for a 10-day tour on 16 March, while Scotland and Oman arrive for a Cricket World Cup League 2 (CWCL2) series at the beginning of April.

The Uganda tour forms part of an annual bilateral series between the two nations and will see Uganda playing two 50-over matches against Namibia, as well as one 50-over match and two T20 matches against Namibia’s second team, now officially called the Eagles XI.

Namibia coach Craig Williams says the tour will help them prepare for the CWCL2 series.

“Uganda have been touring here for the last couple of years so we organised this tour just before our Cricket World Cup League 2 matches, so that we can get decent preperation against a very good Ugandan team,” he says.

The Trinations series between Namibia, Scotland and Oman starts 2 April, continuing till 12 April, and will see the three nations playing two One Day International (ODI) 50-over matches against each other, while Scotland will also play a three-match T20 series against Namibia.

Namibia is currently struggling in sixth position on the eight-team CWCL2 log and Williams says it was very important to pick up points.

“These games are incredibly important for us and we can’t take anything for granted. Scotland are first on the log and Oman fourth, so this is a big series for us at home to obviously get some points. But we’ve been preparing even before the T20 World Cup for this 50-over series so we will be well prepared,” he says.

Regarding Namibia’s performance at the T20 World Cup where they lost all four their group matches, Williams says they gained a lot of valuable experience.

“Obviously our results didn’t show a good world cup, but our preparation and what we learnt at the world cup was really good. In all of the games that we lost we were in a position to win, except for Pakistan. We did well against India, and against Holland and the United States we were in good positions, so the result doesn’t show a good world cup, but if you look at it closely we actually achieved a lot. We ’ve been together in Dubai and then at the world cup for five weeks, so we did an unbelievable amount of training, and the squad is in a really good space,” he says.

One member of the Ugandan team, Juma Miyagi, meanwhile, has already gained first-hand knowledge of Namibian conditions after joining ATG Windhoek High School Old Boys Cricket Club and playing in the local club league.

“Old Boys were actually quite clever, they knew that Uganda were coming on the trip so basically his air ticket is paid already, so they just arranged that he comes three weeks early to play some club cricket for them. Gerhard (Erasmus) played for the Gulf Giants in the ILT (International League T20 in the United Arab Emirates) in December and Juma was in the same team, so I think Gerhard faciliated it,” Williams said.

“Juma’s a very good player, he’s a fast bowler all-rounder and I think it was a good move by Old Boys. At the end of the day you want your clubs to think like this, to see how they can improve, and I hope other clubs can also do something similar, where they look for overseas players to come help in club cricket,” he adds.

Last Saturday, Miyagi gave a fine performance with the ball in a losing cause as WHSOB suffered a comprehensive 118-run defeat to CCD Tigers.

Opening the bowling, Miyagi took three wickets for 50, while his opening partner and Namibian national player Jack Brassell took 4/36. CCD’s national all-rounder Nicole Loftie-Eaton, however, was the star of the show, scoring 101 off 121 balls to guide CCD to 232, before Old Boys were all out for 114.

Wanderers, meanwhile, are leading the log on 16 points, after four wins and a loss, followed by Old Boys (12), Trustco United (8) and CCD (4).

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