Skippers All-round Performance Seals the Match
May 15, 2016 by Prashant Kumar
The weather was just ideal for a good day’s cricket. Engineers captain, Vinay Iyer, after winning the toss decided to bat first putting the onus on the batsmen to put up a healthy total.
Skipper himself walked out with Prashant Kale to open the innings and started cautiously. Keio new ball bowlers, accompanied by the brilliant work in the field, were able to put a check on the scoring during the initial few overs. After getting their eyes in, both openers started looking for big shots. However, Kale, who was returning after his “Ghar Wapsi” break, failed to get going and was finally caught in the deep. It was a rare failure for him. Vinay, on the other hand, completely unperturbed, continued from where he had left in the last match. He kept on finding the fence at will. He was joined by Dinesh, who despite having a leg injury didn’t let the scoring rate dip scoring a quick-fire 22. He was replaced by Saif at the crease, who this time failed to trouble the scorers much. This brought Adrit at the crease. He proved to be the able ally for Vinay. They just kept hitting boundaries with nonchalant ease. The brilliant partnership between these included some excellent running between the wickets as well. Vinay, who was on 89 at the start of the final over, reached 97 in a matter of a couple of balls with double and a brilliant six. Though he had a chance to score back to back hundreds, however, it was not to be. A brilliant captain’s innings from Vinay, who was very well supported by Adrit with 43*, helped Engineers set up a formidable total of 192/3 in 20 overs.
The DEFENCE
Chasing the humongous target of 193 was always going to be difficult for the Keio University. They were trying hard to cut down the risk factor, which also meant compromising on the scoring opportunities. Our new ball bowlers, Anurag and Prakash (PK) were in superb form although their bowling figures don’t reflect to how well they bowled. Anurag in particular created pressure by bowling impeccable line and length but was unlucky to not get some more victims. As they say “ball was doing too much to even get a nick”.
It took 14 overs for Keio to reach 50 for the loss of a wicket. Just as the touring teams have often found the Indian spinners too hot to handle at the international level, it wasn’t much different here as well. The slower bowlers ran through the batting line up. Saif rolled his arm over for 3 wickets and Vinay claiming 4 scalps, including first hat trick of the season. Even Prashant Kale (Editor: What do you mean by “even” 🙂 ), making a bowling comeback of some sort, chipped in with a wicket towards the end. Brilliant bowling and superb fielding by the Engineers were the reasons behind Keio boys succumbing to a meagre total of 70. But even this small total had some sparks of brilliance in between. Hope this outing will help our lesser experienced opponent gain some confidence and they would be able to turn up with more inspirational performances in their next matches.
Highlight of the Day
Today’s win was constructed on the fact that how each member stuck to his assigned tasks and was able to deliver when it mattered. Highlight of the day, undoubtedly was an inspirational performance by the captain both with bat and ball. The bowlers were up to the task, giving away only a few extras and were ably supported by the fielders. Wicket-keeping was excellently done by Prashant Kumar standing upto the stumps (since he was the author of this report , he didn’t mention it – added by Pavethy :p )
The captain couldn’t have asked for more from his troops, with all three departments warming up to the bigger challenges which is expected ahead with a few interesting encounters lined up. Hope we continue with our good work throughout the season. Cheers!!!
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