Washington Cricket Club

Scorecard

Washington Cricket Club WCC-WMCB v Damascus on Sun 29 Apr 2012 at 10:00 AM
Washington Cricket Club Won By 21 runs

Match report Washington beat Damascus by 20 runs in a low scoring escape to victory

The mark of a good team is the willingness and ability to scrap and fight even when not at their best.

Defending champions, us, did just that yesterday as Washington CC defeated Damascus CC by 20 runs in a low scoring season opener at Mark Twain to begin defense of the WMCB championship.

It was a bright, pleasant Sunday morning as Damascus won the toss and invited Washington to bat on what seemed like a good batting wicket. Sameer and Raj opened for us as usual, and found the going a bit tough as the new balls being used this season swung and seamed around. Also, credit where it is due, Damascus opening bowlers bowled a tight line and length at decent pace. Raj went first trying to repeat a lofted drive over mid-on he had successfully executed previously, mistimed it, and got caught at mid-on (4). We were still sort of tentatively feeling our way into the first match of the season when Sameer (3) got out, again mistiming a lofted on drive and Sharath (2) played back when he should have been forward and inside edged it onto the stumps. Not a good start for the defending champs as we were reeling at barely double-digits for 3 down.

Then came a decent partnership in the form of Viraal (15) and Tarun (17) of 35 runs which got us into our innings and it seemed we were pulling ourselves out of a hole when Tarun got out once again trying to loft it over the infield and soon we were 5 down for around 50 when Viraal played across one and was bowled.

After the breakup of a well developing partnership, we had a mini middle order collapse as we lost Fawad (3), who got a rough decision as his bat hit the ground and was given out Caught behind, Murali (6), again to the accursed (on the day) lofted drive, and Pratik(5) ran himself out partly due to miscommunication. We were in deep trouble at 8 down for less than hundred. Meanwhile Ravi (30) held fort at one end, playing a wonderful square drive for four and stayed at one end when he was joined by Ankit (22), who played correct cricket shots without trying anything fancy and inch by inch they scrapped to try and get us something to bowl at, Ankit also taking a hit around his cheek bone when he tried to hook a short ball. Thankfully, the ball just grazed his cheek and he was fine soon enough. They created a good partnership in the face of the continuing disciplined bowling which gave us hope of crossing 150, which would be a decent total to bowl at. But both got out with around 5 overs to go and we ended up with 126. Not a total we expected at the start but we had to make do with it and make a match out of it. In hindsight, the wicket was not as easy to bat on as the new balls used this season swung and seamed all day added to the inconsistent bounce at Mark Twain. Some balls reared up from a length and some kept low. Again in hindsight maybe our score was worth 15-20 runs more, given the wicket.

With the ball, we had a job to do.

And we did start well with ball. Sharath got Ankur Saini, the mainstay of their batting the very first ball of their innings, caught at gully by Jagan. Jagan, playing his first game for Washington, opened the bowling with Sharath and bowled a good one outside off to Avinash and Ravi caught him behind the wicket. With their openers gone cheaply as well, they were under pressure. They had a bit of a partnership going after that but Murali struck when their one drop batsman holed out to mid off for Sharath to manage to hold on to a juggler. They were 3 down for 38 at the end of 10.

We continued to bowl well after the break. Sameer struck in his very first over, trapping the batsman in front with one that came in- a wicket maiden - and Viraal struck soon after, beguiling the batsman with variations in the over and finally trapping him plumb in front. Murali then struck again with a peach of a leg cutter, a jaffa, clean bowling the batsman. We ran through their top and middle order and they were 66/6. From hereon, it was ours to lose. We continued to apply pressure on them with good bowling and backed it up with good fielding, a sliding stop at the boundary by Fawad being the highlight of our ground fielding.

Their lower order tried to offer brief resistance but we snuffed it out with some good catching as Viraal and Sharath struck again to reduce them to 90 odd/8, good catches by Tarun and Raj aiding them. They needed about 25 runs with one wicket to go. Some of you may remember, we have previous experience about this sort of thing! Their number 11 got out with 20 still to get, offering a catch to Raj who judged it well and took it easily, and we had gotten out of jail. We gave a few extras away, an area we can always tighten up on.

A great effort by the boys defending a small total with panache and we redeemed ourselves. It is understandable to start scratchily and we did so. But as I said in the beginning, we struggled with the bat mostly with a couple of exceptions, but never stopped scrapping and fighting. With the ball and in the field, we almost always do so. As long as we remember to do that each time, we will be tough to beat.

Top 3 scorers with the bat:
Ravi – 30
Ankit – 22
Tarun – 17


Top 3 wicket takers:
Sharath – 4/21
Viraal – 2/14
Murali – 2/16




Washington Cricket Club WCC-WMCB Batting
Player Name RunsMB4s6sSRCtStRo
extras
TOTAL :
13w 2b 4lb 
for 10 wickets
19
126		        
Sameer Apte ct Prabhjot 3 1
Raj Srinivasan ct Ankur 4 2
Sharath Parvathavani b Prabhjot 1 1
Tarun Chopra ct Ikwak 17 1
Viral Patel b Karan 15
Fawad Ahmed ct Sumeet 3
Murali Sripadam ct Sumeet 6
Ravi Vellore Run out  30 1
Pratik Goradia Run out  5
Ankit Aggarwal ct Prabhjot 22
Jagannath Surampudi Not Out  0 1

Damascus Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Prabhjot6.211735.672.68
Ankur7.0115115.002.14
Ikwak4.0020120.005.00
Karan8.0134134.004.25
Sumeet4.0020210.005.00
Ibrahim7.011800.002.57

Damascus Batting
Player name RMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
14w 9b 2lb 
for 10 wickets
25
105 (28.0 overs)		     
Ankur ct (c) Jagan (b) Sharath 0
Avinash ct (c) Ravi (b) Jagan 5
Ravi ct (c) Sharath (b) Murali 14
Zeeshan lbw Viral 19
Ikwak lbw Sameer 4
Toufiq b Murali 0
Karan ct (c) Sameer (b) Sharath 17
Khamis ct (c) Tarun (b) Viral 9
Ibrahim ct (c) Raj (b) Sharath 2
Prabhjot Not Out  6
Sumeet ct (c) Raj (b) Sharath 0

Washington Cricket Club WCC-WMCB Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Sharath Parvathavani6.002145.253.50
Jagannath Surampudi5.0019119.003.80
Murali Sripadam5.001628.003.20
Viral Patel6.021427.002.33
Sameer Apte3.0112112.004.00
Ankit Aggarwal3.001300.004.33