The much awaited final of the Winter tournament organized by RBCC was played in the morning at Cypress Canyon Ground (Big) on 28th March 2009.
Blasters won the toss and promptly elected to bowl with the intention of utilizing the early morning conditions.
Panthers chose to open with Santosh and Suresh as the opening pair. The first few overs by Ibrar and Vikram were pretty tight with very few runs being conceeded. Suresh was needlessly run-out early on as he did not wait for the ball to cross the fielder at short cover. Ashish stopped the ball moving to his side and flung the ball to the keeper with accuracy. Shekhar provided the early acceleration with a boundary on the leg side. Santosh returned hurt to the pavilion and Vijay S joined Shekhar. Together they picked up runs at a steady pace to bring some respectability to the score and stability of batting. Shekhar (18 in 27b, 2*4) was bowled by Shailesh but Vijay S continued to bat with confiddence. Santosh resumed his inning but hit one gently and uppishly to point. Samir was brilliantly caught by Rajesh down on the leg side on the first ball he faced to add pressure to the batting.
Hari struck a boundary and also hit one high over point but was bowled by Nitin just when he seemed to get into groove. Ramesh B replaced Hari and along with Vijay tried to increase the momentum of the inning. Vijay S played a steady, face saving knock of 37 valuable runs (37b, 2*4) but was caught in the quest of quick runs towards the end. Ramesh, Rupesh and Yogesh lost their wickets in the search of quick runs. Rosie struck an accurate Vikram for two boundaries towards square leg to take the Panthers to a score of 106/10 in 19.5 overs.
Previous experience had indicated that this would be a score that was very much achievable in the less than the alloted quota of overs for the side batting second. Panthers did not plan on scoring run a ball, giving importance to saving wickets at the top, which did not materialize in runs thereby added pressure on the batsmen and relieved any anxiety for the fielding side.
Ibrar launched an assault in the second over after a relatively quiet first over bowled by Vijay S. Harish was dismissed but the replacement Rajesh struck two hige sixes towards long-on to surprise the Panthers opening pair of Vijay S and Ramesh B. Short balls were dispatched in the vacant field behind square on the leg side and anything pitched up was hit straight in the V behind the bowler. Rajesh survived a confident appeal for run-out, courtesy of a dismal call made by Nirav P. 42 runs were scored in 4 overs thereby leaving the Blasters with an easy task of scoring 65 runs in 16 overs.
Captain Rupesh then enforced a couple of bowling changes to pick up the wickets of Ibrar (27, 20b, 6*4) and Rajesh (24, 12b, 1*4, 2*6) but the brisk start at the top had left the dressing room at ease about the chase. Shailesh walked in and continued the aggressive approach hitting Samir for a boundary. Ishwak continued in the same vein, lofting one over cover and mid-wicket for a boundary. Ishwak (19, 3b, 2*4) and Shailesh (17, 14b, 2*4) fell when just a few runs were required for victory.
Blasters, literally blasted their way to victory in a meagre 14 overs making it a one sided game in the second half. Ibrar with 2 wickets with the ball and a trend setting 27 runs with the bat was declared Man of the Finals. Shailesh remained a puzzle throughout the series with figures of 4-0-12-3 in the final. Blasters did very well to win this extended tournament that spanned almost three months with eight teams participating.
The much fancied Panthers could not keep the same momentum as in the early part of the tournament to bring disappointment to many a player of this side.
PS:- A few have asked for the blog and I had to finally give in to keep the posts complete. Details might be a bit hazy as more than a month has gone by.
http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=rhkOSA1zP4g28bA3WpSJSOw&hl=en
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