11

The morning skies were gloomy. There were a few thunder and lightning across the skies. Perhaps it was the indication of the things that were about to unfold.

I got up at 6 am. My alarm was screaming. I woke up and got ready. As I left my house, a slight drizzle started to come down as I drove towards my office. By the time I reached my office it was a complete down pour. The team, which had assembled in front of the office, was not so realistic that the grounds will be dry to play our first league match. We were all bit excited about the match and I was especially looking forward to it. This news was a bit of a damper.

We decided to go to the ground and check if the conditions were good enough to play. By the time we reached the ground at AM Jain College of Arts and Science, the situation looked a bit grim. All three grounds were soaked and looked as if the match will either be postponed tomorrow or we would be getting 1 points each. We were to play PMCC. But as always, I was hopeful that we would get the chance to show our skills in the field. Myself and my two friends, Vignesh and Deepak examined the pitch. It did look gloomy.

Vignesh and Deepak examining the Pitch

 

Water puddle near the pitch

 

The Ground at 8 a.m.

 

Some of our feathered friends came to watch us in action

 

Ground at the end of Play

 

However, we soon realized that the situation was not that bad. The pitch itself was wet but it could dry off quickly, if the sun came up earlier. In addition, the half side of the pitch was dry enough and other half was wet. We figured if we could start the match by 9.30 am, the sun would be up by then and the remaining side of the pitch will soon be dried off. In addition, the grounds-men told us that they will help us in getting rid of those small patches of water that was logged in the pitch. And exactly as we hoped, the pitch soon dried off and we started the match at around 9.45am.

 

The Toss

We lost the toss. Our plan was to win the toss and put up a good total and then quickly get some wickets during the second innings. But things again changed. We were asked to bad first. This was a good sign. We had a good team and hoped for a solid start. Although there was a bit of a concern. Our team consisted of new members playing their first league match. About 3-5 members were veterans and rest were newbies. Although, this did not pose any real threat in terms of experience, we always had some good batting in the team and we were not worried.

 

Our Innings

Disaster struck. On the first ball, our opening pair had a bit of mis-communication and we lost our first batsman to a run out in the first ball of the innings. We were 0/1. However, the next batsman who got down, started playing some strokes and runs started to flow in. But again disaster struck and we were two down. The third player went in and started to stabilize the innings. We then started our break neck speed run rate. We started gaining momentum, and the opponents started to feel if they had a lucky strike in the first ball.

 

However, things are always not they seem. We started loosing wickets regularly even though we were averaging atleast 6 or 7 runs per over. By the end of 10 overs we were 64. The players in the field looked confident and started playing their game. There were a couple of controversial wickets that were given in favor of the opponent team. But in this game, you should be prepared to handle such situations and play the game. Had those wickets not given in favor of the bowler, the end result would have changed.

 

By loosing wickets, we started to play cautiously and then we started loosing the run rate. I was the last batsman to get into the field, when the score read 74/9 in 14 overs. Captain gave me a clear message. Never try to hit too hard or too fast. Consolidate your innings, get some runs on the board, keep it ticking and do not loose your wicket. It was very important at that stage that we did not loose any wicket (quite obvious of course) but also because it would act as a demoralizing factor in our first game. I was very determined not to loose my wicket and play only the balls that I can hit.

 

My partner on the crease, who had hold out quite long enough knew how the bowlers were bowling. He soon gave me a pep talk on Do’s and Don’ts. I got on the crease, it was hot. It was burning hot. I was amazed at the fielders standing in this hot summer and playing. Then I realized the one thing that my Captain emphasis was on. Do not loose wicket. If we did, we would have to bowl the entire 25 overs in this hot summer and that would take quite a toll on the bowlers. If we could hold out the entire 25 overs, then we could probably have to bowl about 20-22 overs because due to the time factor.

 

For my part, I was satisfied with my performance although I did not feel great. Batting down the order and trying to keep the wicket is definitely the hardest thing to do in such conditions. You have to prepare yourself for the worst in every ball and then try to think ways to hit the ball so that you could scrap couple of runs. In the end, we did hold out just long enough. My partner tried to hit the ball across and was bowled out. I did not realize until I returned to the pavilion, that we had amassed 18 runs for the final wicket partnership. My personal best 5* (not out).

 

The End

All in all, we had made 92 runs in 22 overs. The target was set at 93 runs in 25 overs, averaging 3.72 runs per over. For the opponents, this would probably be the easiest runs that one could wish for and for us, it was the worst score that we could hope to defend for. But we did, and we did it with style. We went out with our guns blazing. We made the batsman earn each and every run. We also started getting wickets regularly. Again there was a controversial catch which the umpire gave in favor of the batsman.

 

There was a great commitment from the bowlers to get some wickets quickly. And quickly they did. We had them reeling at one stage with 57/5. But then the heat got on to us. The batsman knew this and started playing the bad balls aggressively. In the end, we lost. However, I will still call this as a loss a good one, because the way we fought during the batting when the middle and tail enders were exposed quickly and again during our fielding and bowling sessions, they way we made a came back. It also showed us what we can do, and what are the things that we are supposed to concentrate on. We need some partnerships. We need some good fielding practise to get some runs. And I personally need to build more stamina to stay and get some runs.

 

At the end of the match, it remained me of the Battle of Thermopylae (I know it sounds quirky but that’s what I felt). Although, the Persians had nearly 1 million army, Kind Leonadis with a small army of 300 with 7000 Greeks fought against them and gave them good time to retreat and regroup so that they could fight another day and win the War. I would say that this is not going to be the end of this story, and we will regroup and fight another day where we will win the final battle.

 

The scorecard of this match will be published later.

*** UPDATE ***

Scorecard:

Ist Innings: Batting

 

Frost & Sullivan Cricket Club (FCC)

IInd Innings: Batting

PMCC

 

 

 

Part I: The stage is set!

Hmmm… So, finally I got the email for the final 12 for my team for this week’s match. I am eager to play this game and a bit nervous as well. Our team’s official wicketkeeper, ATP is quitting and hence won’t be able to play for us anymore. Hence, we need a new keeper and I have been asked to carry on the mantle. Though, I am excited and happy to don the gloves once more, it has been a while since I did keeping. It was back in school and college days but it has been a long time since then.

I believe that some fear is always good, because it keeps you pro-active rather than active. Anticipate how the ball is going to move, and how the batsman is going to play that particular ball will enable me to be there when he nicks the ball to my hands. And largely because you do not want to screw up the chance for getting a wicket!!!

Our main bowlers such as KK, Sriram, Vignesh, Deepak will have to bowl well and put some pressure early on to the opposite team. And our batting has also to be rock solid if we are going to bat first. Although there has been a quite a few new entries for the match, I would say this is going to exciting as hell!

Team Suman:

Suman (Captain), Sriram (Vice Captain), Ramesh, Karthi (Wk), Vignesh, Ashwin, Prakash, Gunaranjan, KK, Mahesh, Deepak, Rajesh.

Team Konda:

Konda (Captain), BK (Vice Captain), Shabeer, Mani (Wk), Anba, Siva, Srivatsan, Shashank, Sriram, Kothanda, Bharat, Ranjit.

Good luck to both the teams!!

I will come up with more updates once the match is over, with scoreboards, analysis of the match, who won the MoM (Man-of-Match) award and so on.

Cricket and Me…

Cricket has been one of my passions during my school and college days. Though I like football (soccer) more than Cricket, I always loved to play whenever I get the chance.

The last time, I ever touched a bat was away back during my college days. I played for my college team. After almost 5 years, I decided to play Cricket. This sunday was the day. I got up early and was excited to play my first game after 5 years. I reached the ground just to find all of my friends and other team players had arrived. We started a brief warm-up.

I was suprised at the amount of professionalism that went into the game. We had the entire set, even two umpires for the game. It was a 30 overs game. I had never played this game in this kind of setup before, so I was even more excited and decided to concentrate on the game and put up a good show.

Toss was done, and we lost it. The opposite team decided to bat first. The ground was quick in one direction and grassy on the other. Hence, whom ever plays first had the chance to score big if they played it right. Our job was simple. We had to focus on getting wickets. I was asked to don the role of Wicketkeeper, as I was a former wicketkeeper for my college team.

One problem I faced was, I hadn’t played with cricket ball before. So I was a bit apprenhensive, but nevertheless I was up for the challenge. The first over went good, the bowler didn’t give too much width for the batsman to play around with. However, the opening batsman who were in form, started attacking the bowlers. They started to hit fours and sixes and the ball was all over the field. There was a couple of mis-fields and couple of opportunities missed (including two catches from my side – my only defense, it was a difficult one and it was difficult to judge how the ball was going to swing).

Our bowlers also did try to keep the opening pair in check and finally broke the parternship before break. However, the score had soared to 106 for 1 in 13 overs, with a runrate of  8.15. The second wicket parternship had also grown a bit stronger. We needed wickets and we needed them fast. Our captain, Abhinav, started his spell. It was pure brilliance. He had pace and swing. He came in and broke the parternship quickly. We soon had them reeling and soon wickets at regular intervals started to fall. By the end of 30 overs they had scored a staggering 195 all out. We were tired but we wanted to go into the field and give them a fitting reply.

The opening batsman started off with a four in the third ball and things started to look bright and hopefull. The opening pair, though consistently scored almost 5 to 6 runs per over, the asking runrate kept climbing. The runrate was 5.7 approximately. Soon there difference between the runs and balls was 20. Difficult but not impossible. We had wickets. But then disaster struck when due to mis-communication, our captain who was hitting all over the place, had run out!

Then the rest of us fought untill the last ball finally loosing out for 180 for 9. I was the last batsman (not out!). It was a wonderful game all-in-all. Despite our loss, I felt like I was kid again. I had played my heart out. Even though I didn’t get the chance to see what I can do with the bat, (no pun intended) I was feeling all pumped up and excited to play. This also a good exercise for me. It really showed my fitness level and how much strain my body could go through. It was scorching heat and I was wicketkeeping for almost 25 overs!. That I feel was  a feat by itself as I have almost never went for any exercising for the last several months.

There is another match next saturday and I am positive that I will get a better opportunity to show what I can do.  I also plan to get myself physically ready for the next match and do better.

Untill next match…

Cricket and Me…

Cricket has been one of my passions during my school and college days. Though I like football (soccer) more than Cricket, I always loved to play whenever I get the chance.

The last time, I ever touched a bat was away back during my college days. I played for my college team. After almost 5 years, I decided to play Cricket. This sunday was the day. I got up early and was excited to play my first game after 5 years. I reached the ground just to find all of my friends and other team players had arrived. We started a brief warm-up.

I was suprised at the amount of professionalism that went into the game. We had the entire set, even two umpires for the game. It was a 30 overs game. I had never played this game in this kind of setup before, so I was even more excited and decided to concentrate on the game and put up a good show.

Toss was done, and we lost it. The opposite team decided to bat first. The ground was quick in one direction and grassy on the other. Hence, whom ever plays first had the chance to score big if they played it right. Our job was simple. We had to focus on getting wickets. I was asked to don the role of Wicketkeeper, as I was a former wicketkeeper for my college team.

One problem I faced was, I hadn’t played with cricket ball before. So I was a bit apprenhensive, but nevertheless I was up for the challenge. The first over went good, the bowler didn’t give too much width for the batsman to play around with. However, the opening batsman who were in form, started attacking the bowlers. They started to hit fours and sixes and the ball was all over the field. There was a couple of mis-fields and couple of opportunities missed (including two catches from my side – my only defense, it was a difficult one and it was difficult to judge how the ball was going to swing).

Our bowlers also did try to keep the opening pair in check and finally broke the parternship before break. However, the score had soared to 106 for 1 in 13 overs, with a runrate of  8.15. The second wicket parternship had also grown a bit stronger. We needed wickets and we needed them fast. Our captain, Abhinav, started his spell. It was pure brilliance. He had pace and swing. He came in and broke the parternship quickly. We soon had them reeling and soon wickets at regular intervals started to fall. By the end of 30 overs they had scored a staggering 195 all out. We were tired but we wanted to go into the field and give them a fitting reply.

The opening batsman started off with a four in the third ball and things started to look bright and hopefull. The opening pair, though consistently scored almost 5 to 6 runs per over, the asking runrate kept climbing. The runrate was 5.7 approximately. Soon there difference between the runs and balls was 20. Difficult but not impossible. We had wickets. But then disaster struck when due to mis-communication, our captain who was hitting all over the place, had run out!

Then the rest of us fought untill the last ball finally loosing out for 180 for 9. I was the last batsman (not out!). It was a wonderful game all-in-all. Despite our loss, I felt like I was kid again. I had played my heart out. Even though I didn’t get the chance to see what I can do with the bat, (no pun intended) I was feeling all pumped up and excited to play. This also a good exercise for me. It really showed my fitness level and how much strain my body could go through. It was scorching heat and I was wicketkeeping for almost 25 overs!. That I feel was  a feat by itself as I have almost never went for any exercising for the last several months.

There is another match next saturday and I am positive that I will get a better opportunity to show what I can do.  I also plan to get myself physically ready for the next match and do better.

Untill next match…

Shame, Shame, Puppy Shame…

South Africa Whips India again (source: Rediff.com)

Justin Kemp’s maiden limited-overs century helped South Africa fightback and score a 106-run victory over India in the third one-day international in Cape Town on Sunday. (read more…)

India has done it again. I am not sure if I am hard enough on the boys but they really need to pull their act together if they have any hopes to win draw the series. I am appalled by their performance… if they continue to perform this way (and Chapelle … Shame on You too!)… we can definitely rule out wining next year World Cup!

High Tension update:

Don’t worry its all over. The walk-in that I went on saturday proved un-fruitful as they were not looking for C++/VC++ programmers. I can relax now and start focusing on what I should be doing…

However, this issue has brought my focus towards one issue that is bothering me for sometime now. For the past couple of days, I seem to hit the panic zone when it comes to an interview or a test. I should be relaxed and more focused on how I perform rather than worrying about the pro’s and con’s of the event. I have always taken these interviews in a lighter mood which helps me to focus on the interview itself without worrying too much about the least significant issues. This attitude has also helped me in the current job as it require talking to several top level management people of various companies.

I believe this is just temporary thing and I will be soon be on attending such events with ease !