PSCC v/s Crescent CC Match Report

There was one prime objective for PSCC in the match against Crescent CC held at Mark Twain Grounds on June 24, 2006 and that was to win the game, and win it big to make up for the lean net run rate in the league so far. Riding on the back of a morale boosting batting display against Washington CC and also with an added fillip of Maninder Bola coming into the team, PSCC scored an almost unassailable 200 runs -batting first- for the loss of 9 wickets in 40 overs. Although there was not a great opening partnership, the opening batsmen made their intentions very clear upfront. They were looking for runs and went about their jobs very aggressively. Charan should feel trifle unlucky to have been caught down the legside off his glove. In walked Maninder, who stitched a 58 run partnership with Sathya in quick time. Sathya played well all around the wicket but was especially severe on anything pitched short. The batsmen picked singles up at will. Maninder's wicket fell against the run of play when he tried to pinch a run to mid-off and got out to a direct hit. Sathya's wicket was more due to the ruthless heat than anything else. On the last ball of the 15th over, Sathya was out caught at first slip after a few dot balls where he tried to go for big shots but missed. His score of 37 ended up being the top score of the match. Next came the most entertaining period of batting when Matter and Shiv made a mockery of the bowling and boundaries were flowing. Although Matter had some good fortune go his way, Shiv went about his business at ease and hit a flurry of boundaries - 5 in all - and a six. The pick of matter's shots was a straight-driven six that landed well outside the boundary, after the bowler had brought in couple of extra close-in catchers. Splendid, really! Vivek and Herman carried on the good work although they started slow but made sure 200 will be reached. In all, it was a very good mixture of stroke-making and opportunistic running between the wickets. While Shiv and Matter were in the middle, a score in excess of 225 seemed quite possible but knowing the bowling resources of PSCC, a score of 200 was plenty.

Herman opened the bowling along with Subash, and it was quite clear right away that Crescent CC would try to knock of some early runs using some lower order batsmen. Therefore, the idea was to bowl back of length and protect boundaries on the leg-side. Lo and behold, Herman struck with the second delivery, after the first was hit across the line for a boundary, with Charan taking a comfortable catch at mid-on. Subash struck in his first over as well, with Maninder taking a good catch at mid-wicket boundary. Herman got another wicket in his 4th over (30/3) with peach of a delivery that came into the batsman and caught him in front. Subash kept matters quiet at the other end. The first bowling change saw a flurry of boundaries, as Maninder's rust showed a little bit while he struggled to hit one line. However, Matter was introduced soon and made things a lot harder for the batsmen with his pace and bounce. He quite deservedly took 2 wickets in his 2nd and 3rd overs. The fielding effort from PSCC was a mixed bag with Shiv, Maninder and Matter taking remarkable catches while Subash and Cheeru dropped absolute sitters - Subash, infact, two. Shiv's catch at the deep off the bowling of charan deserves a special mention as he ran a good 15 yards in and dived headlong to pull off a great catch, just few inches off the ground. Maninder was brought back into the attack and bowled a lot better than his first spell and finished off the proceddings when he had the batsman edging to Shiv at second slip. Charan finsihed as the top wicket taker with 4 wickets for a measly 8 runs in 5 overs.

Overall, PSCC outplayed Crescent in all three facets of the game and deservedly, earned a huge victory by a margin of 95 runs.

Inn 1: PSCC - 200/9 in 40 overs (Sathya - 37, Shiv - 33, Herman - 25)
Inn 2: Crescent CC - 105 All out in 25.1 overs (Charan - 4/8, Mahesh - 2/15, Herman - 2/23)
The entire scorecard can be viewed here.

Report by: Gaja

WCC v/s PSCC Match report

After a disastrous batting display against Alexandria CC which PSCC lost by 3 wickets, it was highly imperative that the PSCC batsmen put out a strong display of their batting abilities in the match against Washington CC on June 10, 2006 at Kettering, to stay in the hunt for the WMCB SOuth division. Washington CC won the toss and chose to bat first, but found the initial going not very easy as some disciplined bowling by Matter and Subash ensured that WCC got to the first drinks break at 25/3. The second session saw a rapid increase in their runrate primarily due to some indisciplined bowling that was compounded by umpiring that gave the bowlers no leeway. However, Charan and Matter took a few important wickets to stem the flow and the score stood at 85/7 at the 20 over mark. Choksi and Rajesh struggled really hard in bowling on one side of the wicket which saw some easy runs made by the WCC tailenders. When the debutant Jinay was finally introduced, he polished off the tail with 2 quick wickets in the 8 balls he bowled. That left a a modest, but a challenging 150 runs to made in the alloted 40 overs.

Sathya set the ball rolling with a boundary on the onside of the first ball of the run chase. Although he was hard done by the umpiring decision in the next over itself having been adjudged LBW, he had set the tone for the rest of the innings. Charan and Shiv motored along at a fast clip till Shiv fell to an innocuous low full toss on the score of 35 in the 7th over. Matter took over the match from there on and went on to make a huge undefeated score of 74 in just 69 deliveries. His innings was studded with 7 boundaries and an effortless six over midwicket. He was ably supported, initially by charan, and later on by Vivek and Choksi. Although Vivek and Choksi made only 6 and 8* respectively, each of them had partnerships of 44 and 50 runs with Matter, which ensured we got home with more than 10 overs to spare. Undoubtedly, Matter had the batting performance of the season yet, which will hopefully inspire the others to follow suit.

Inn 1: WCC- 149 All out in 33 overs (Mahesh K - 3/18, Jinay Doshi - 2/2)
Inn 2: PSCC - 150/4 in 29.3 overs (Mahesh K - 74*, Charan - 19)
The entire scorecard can be viewed here.

Report by: Gaja