COLUMBUS CRICKET
CLUB
Today was the big day! The finals of the Cincy Cup! The anticipation was sharpened by the controversies surrounding whether the game would be held at all! We were raring to go and win this cup cleanly and emphatically. The weather Gods in Columbus didn’t seem to care - but luckily, the Cincy weather was dry – but cold as a witch’s teet ! Welcome to cricket in the 40s.
CCC won the toss on a day and it was an interesting
decision whether to bat or bowl first. The overcast conditions seem to favor
bowling first but it was a safe bet that they would continue thru the day.
Finally, the magnitude of the game edged us towards batting first and putting the pressure on the team
chasing.
Venky & Ravi Mangipudi walked in to bat, runs
started flowing in the first few overs, helped
by some extras from Shihab opening pair (JB & Farooq). It wasn’t long before Venky tried to hoist one over extra cover and did not get
all of it resulting in an easy looping catch at cover-point. Hari walked
at #3 and looked like he is ready to take off from the 50 he made at the same venue a few weeks ago. . He
defended the good balls but was mostly dominating the attack with sweetly timed strokes. His straight drives were
especially a treat to watch, while his
pulls were stamped with authority. Ravi M fell next, LBW (14), playing across
to a straight delivery. He partnered
Hari for an important 43 runs, which lifted the doubts in the minds of the middle order. Eswar started off with a
terrific midwicket pull to the fence
and was looking in good touch. After a
30 run partnership dominated by Hari,
Eswar was undone, LBW (9), to a
faster one from Kaleem.. Abhi
walked in next, took a little while to get
his bearings and started to stroke the ball comfortably in the “V”. Hari meanwhile, completed his half
century with ease and was looking for
the big one! He was finally dismissed
after putting on 38 runs for the 4th
wicket with Abhi for 70. Bharat walked
in at a juncture when CCC was reasonably
comfortable at 124/4 in 22.3 overs.
We were hoping to reach around 200 at this point - little did we know his intentions. He started off with his trademark boundaries
and a couple of sixes. We thought OK, we’ll get to 200 for
sure. Then he launched a breath-taking
array of shots – mostly sixers – all
around the ground, I mean all around the ground! It did not matter who the
bowler was or where the ball pitched – they all ended up outside the boundary!
In a blink, he crossed his 50 and in another, he crossed Hari’s monumental
70. This was an innings deserving to be put on Pay-per-view, right along side
Oscar Dela Hoya’s boxing matches and some
late night movies! The rest of us were
shouting our voices hoarse and hugging
each other! ..He was 16 short of a blindingly-fast century with 4 balls to
spare, when he thick edged a wild swing
for Sunny to take a decent catch (84 in 28 balls – go figure!).
Abhi on
the other end, played his natural game, paced his innings beautifully
around Hari & Bharat’s monumental
efforts, and ended not out on 38 well made runs. The keys to Bharat’s
worry-free innings were the solid foundation provided by the preceding
batsmen, primarily Hari – and the
excellent partnership from Abhi – without those, he could not have gone all out. We ended at an undreamt of 239 - 8 runs an over!!! Our two biggest guns not only fired, but they roared!!!
It only got better – with Biryani for lunch!
If there was any question of whether Shihab will
make a fight of it, Sekhar ended it with a resounding rattle -- clean bowled Moazzam with his very first
ball – this is the guy who scored 63 in the previous game at the same venue
against UCC. The delivery started to
look like a regulation outswinger, but held back to go through the defenses of
the bewildered batsman. Absar was looking in decent touch on the other side.
Sunny walked in next and Sekhar produced another sharp swinging delivery to
bowl him off the inside edge. Amit, not to be outdone, got Kaleem to hurry
into a pull to top edge an easy catch to Sekhar at short cover. Sunjay Patel then
removed Absar with Murthy doing well to hold the catch at short third man. At
3/48, CCC had an iron grip on the game
and that caused the players to relax a bit – may be a bit too much. Farooq
& Saeed silently went on accumulating runs and sneaked to 78 off 13 overs.
Shihab needed 160 off 17 overs – around 9 runs an over with 6 wickets in
hand, difficult but not impossible. CCC
then applied timely brakes to take two quick wickets and peg Shihab back. . Hari
stumped Farooq on a sharp
delivery from Amit. Saeed & Saim,
later put up brief resistance, stroked a few well timed shots, but were never
anywhere near the ‘concern-zone’ for CCC.
Kosike finally got Saim, with Eswar picking up Saeed. Amit came back to
pick up two more wickets in his fourth over to end with impressive figures of
4/20 off 4 overs. Sekhar completed a hat-trick of catches for Amit. All the three catches he took were off Amit
Atrey’s bowling – talk of team work among the CCC pacers!
On a cold,
blustery, windy day when eyes were watering when you run up to bowl, hats off
to Sekhar and Amit for bowling like the champions that they are! SCC was bundled out for 132, giving us a 107
run victory!!!
We couldn’t
have asked for a better ending at the
last tourney game of the season.
The victory in the finals was sweet and it was a great feeling bringing
the elegant-looking Cup home. We won
the finals beyond a shade of doubt as to who was the better team on that
day! This emphatic victory will resound
in Columbus cricket circles for some time and underscore what a competitive
team we are in Ohio. This makes the
semi-final exit in MCT, slightly easier to swallow (just barely).
Not to lose sight of the friendly atmosphere we
played the game in – Shihab were a friendly bunch and kudos to them for playing
with many of their players fasting. The
organizers did an outstanding job all thru the tournament and deserve our
sincere appreciation and support in future.
Cold as a witch’s teet it may have been but we were
too hot to handle today, as we got on to our brooms and drove back to Columbus
– Happy Halloween -- GO CCC!!!
Ravi Mangipudi
Bharat Jataprolu
Wilson Fernando
Abhijeet Deshpande
Murthy Ayyagari