'OM Sixer OM' as Dalania XI thrash Appu brigade

The 3rd match of MCL was an eagerly awaited contest between Appu Brigade and Dalania XI. It was an important match for Dalania XI considering the fact that they lost their first match against Ashwin XI. delivered the punch putting on 200 runs on the board that sent Appu Brigade crashing to a 116 run defeat. Om Prakash was the star performer hitting an unbeaten 123 that knocked the day lights out of the opposition.

Dalania XI opened with Om and Punit. Rohan bowled the first over that and took quite a while to start off bowling 5 wides. The openers seemed to have contrasting strategies with Om trying to send every ball out of the ground and Punit taking a defensive stance letting the ball go past his bat. Neither of them could get any wood on the ball and the score was 10 after 3 overs. Things changed after that with Punit hitting a couple of fours and couple of sixers before he was squared up by Sarthak who struck in his second over. Meanwhile Om started meanwhile was getting into the groove hitting a couple of sixers. Captain Vivek who came in next rotated the strike well before sending the ball over the ropes twice. After 10 overs, the score was 65 for the loss of one wicket. What followed in the next 10 overs was Om’s show as he hit boundaries at his will. The 11th over disappeared for 19 runs, the 12th for 20 runs as Om toyed with the bowling. Om gave a tough chance when he skied the ball once and had 3 fielders trying to catch it. Apart from that, it was a flawless innings by Om who went on to score an unbeaten century. None of the bowlers made any kind of impact except Akshay Appu. Dalania departed for 21 caught by Ajinkya off Parul. Yohan who came in next was out first ball stumped by Appu off Rohan. These wickets however didn’t make any difference to the run-rate with Om batting in a different zone altogether. His last 90 runs came off a mere 35 balls with the boundaries to all parts of the ground. Cooper who came in next remained unbeaten on 5 and more importantly took a single off the last delivery which took the score to 200.

Needing 201 to win, Appu Brigade opened in with Akshay Appu and Rohan. Having no option but to hit out, Akshay hit 2 sixers in the first over with Om receiving a dose of his own medicine. However Akshay fell off the 5th ball of the first over caught by Punit trying another big hit. Om thus inflicted another blow this time with his bowling that rounded off a perfect day for him where he could do nothing wrong. Sarthak who came in next and Rohan tried to put the innings on course but Rohan left bowled by Yajant who was operating at a good pace. Sarthak hit a six before he Yohan bowled him for 12. Parul who came in next hit a couple of boundaries. The run-rate however was only getting higher and that made things very tough for Appu Brigade. Captain Vivek bowled Parul for 14 and it was only a matter of time before the rest of the batting caved in. Appu brigade managed just 84 runs which was the lowest score of the tournament so far and in the process suffered a 116 run defeat. For Dalania’s team, K. Akshay bowled well and ended up with 3 wickets giving away just 7 runs. Yohan took 3 for 15.

The last 2 matches of MCL have been pretty one-sided with Neeraj XI and Dalania XI registering easy wins. One only hopes for a better and a balanced contest with Appu Brigade taking on Manas XI tomorrow.

Absolute win for Neeraj XI

It was the 2^nd match of the MCL tournament, between Neeraj’s XI and Absolute XI (which had players from PGPCMX, RCM and CCC). Absolute XI was an unknown entity with very few players having played at MICA earlier. Neeraj XI boasted of a few good players like Ashish Rao, Neeraj and Gaurav. Neeraj’s team won the toss and elected to bowl. With the match starting before 7:30 pm, the dew and the wet ball was a bit of concern.

Absolute XI captain Varun and Manan opened the innings. Ashish Rao opened the bowling and started off well troubling the batsmen with his immaculate line and length. Varun was lucky to survive the first over. Neeraj who bowled the 2^nd over was good and soon Absolute XI openers were struggling to find some kind of momentum. Ashish then produced a beauty and had Manan clean bowled. Varun who was living a charmed life was the next to go caught behind by Abhay off Neeraj. As if this was not enough, the running between the wickets of Absolute XI was awful. It appeared as if they had never run between the wickets before. Rahul who came in next tried to run for a single that never existed and was run-out. In the next over, Jimmesh was also run-out with the stumps broken at the non-strikers end this time by Ashish. At this stage, Absolute XI was tottering at 10/4 with their top order batsmen back in the pavilion. Not taking away any credit from the bowlers, Absolute XI had only themselves to blame for not doing the basic stuff right and ending up in a deep hole. Sachin and Mihir then injected some life into the innings with both of them hitting sixers. Rohan went for 11 runs in his over and was replaced by Aneesh. Ankush who was also going for runs then picked up Mihir caught by Aneesh. It was a vital blow considering the fact that Mihir and Sachin were just building a partnership. Sachin tried a hit too many and was bowled by .Feroz, who came in next fell in similar fashion to Aneesh who was rewarded for keeping it full. With seven wickets down and not even 50 runs on the board Absolute XI was in an absolute soup. Playing out the full quota of 20 seemed quite a task at this stage and the pair of Raghu and Sudarshan was content in doing just that. They put on a useful stand before Raghu fell to Aneesh caught by Ankush. Sudarshan fell next caught by Gaurav off the bowling of Abhay. The last wicket pair of Abhijit and Sheetal batted sensibly with Abhijit hitting a four and Sheetal clearing the leg side boundary. The innings folded up at 86 when Abhijit was caught behind off Ankush. Aneesh finished with impressive figures of 3 for 13 for the bowling team.

Neeraj’s XI opened with Aneesh and Gaurav. Chasing a target of 87, Neeraj’s XI was off to a flyer with Gaurav hitting Varun for a couple of boundaries in the first over. With the power play restrictions in place the full tosses bowled by Varun proved to be costly. Sheetal bowled a tight second over giving nothing away. Varun took himself off the attack and gave Manan the third over. Gaurav went after Manan hitting him for 4s and 6s at will. The first 5 balls went for 25 runs. Manan finally had Gaurav caught by Sheetal but by then the damage had been done. Gaurav’s 34 came off just 17 balls and dented the psyche of the Absolute team. Sheetal at the other end continued to bowled well. Varun came back for a second spell and kept it tight but none of the other bowlers made any kind of impact. Abhijit , Mihir and Jimmesh leaked runs without making any impact . Aneesh went after the bowlers while Neeraj gave him good company at the other end. Jimmesh came and disappeared for 18 runs in 2 balls, bowling a couple of no-balls. Neeraj’s XI romped home in just 8.2 over. Aneesh scored 28 off just 20 balls and was rightly adjudged the man of the match for his all-round effort. Neeraj remained unbeaten on 19 off 18 balls.

Absolute XI will need to pull up their socks especially in their bowling department, to compete in the rest of the tournament. This was a good start for Neeraj XI but they will need to prove their mettle against tougher opponents awaiting them.