Ghana’s cricket team is facing a string of disappointments as they struggle in the ongoing West Africa Trophy tournament held at the Tafawa Balewa Cricket Oval in Lagos, with their latest loss marking the fourth consecutive defeat in the series. The Ghanaians have expressed their frustration over their batting performance as they suffered a hat-trick of defeats at the hands of Nigeria, one of their main rivals in the tournament.
In a recent match, Nigeria’s right-hand batter, Ademola Onikoyi, displayed a remarkable performance, leading the Yellow Greens to secure a victory against Ghana by five wickets. Despite their slow start in the game, Nigeria managed to chase a target of 110 runs set by Ghana.
The Ghanaians had shown promise in the first innings, putting up an impressive performance with a total of 109 runs scored in 20 overs. However, their batting struggles continued as they failed to defend their target. The slow start in Nigeria’s second innings, with early wickets falling, gave hope to the Ghanaian team. Still, Ademola Onikoyi and his teammates managed to turn the tide in Nigeria’s favor, with Onikoyi’s crucial sixes in the 17th over contributing to the Yellow Greens’ victory.
The win completed a treble for Nigeria over their archrivals in the tournament, having beaten them in their previous two meetings in the series.
Ghana’s opening bowler, Godfred Bakiweyem, said they hoped for a win over hosts Nigeria but added that the game took a different turn in the closing stages.
“Well, it’s the game of cricket, while we were training back home, our batting was clicking while our bowling wasn’t doing well. But here, we have been struggling with our batting and the bowling has been right so far,” Bakiweyem told us.
It’s painful we couldn’t get one over Nigeria but we will go back to the drawing board and see what we can get in our next two matches. Hopefully, it will be enough to get us another meeting with Nigeria in the final.”
Ghana have three wins from seven matches and their hopes of reaching the final are hinged on their crucial tie against Rwanda on Thursday (today), as well as their last round-robin game against Sierra Leone on Saturday.
Nigeria remains unbeaten after seven games with two more games to go against Sierra Leone today and Rwanda on Saturday.
The top two teams from this stage will face it in the final on Sunday, October 15.
