Victory in a T20 match against Devils Cricket Club at Thakur Stadium, Kandivali, 7am, 12th Dec 2015

We batted first today, myself and Sanat opened the innings and had a good opening partnership of 50 odd runs, it was a difficult wicket, a bit two paced with the balls bouncing off a length and sometimes keeping low... We stayed there, punished the bad balls and laid a good foundation for others to follow.... I got out to a bad ball that suddenly bounced off a length and caught the outside edge scoring 27 off 19balls, Sanat also hung in there and played for the team and scored 20 odd runs.. Then came Sarfraz, from ball 1 he looked in good touch, and was nicely middling the ball, I'm not sure how much he scored, so if any of you know, kindly update.. He didn't waste any balls and as always, played a team innings, not allowing any wickets to fall, punished all the bad balls, ran well between the wickets and set the platform for the onslaught. I think the opposition bowled well in the death overs, of course helped by the difficult wicket, and didn't allow us to post a huge total.... Neil started well with a boundary but got out trying to up the run-rate. Finally there was a good partnership between Gaurav and Jugal, where they ran many a risky single and also ran one or two 4’s, on one occasion Jugal hit a piercing shot through the 1st slip and all the way to the third man boundary, only he could've played such a masterstroke We set a target of 140 on a pitch that was becoming slower as the game progressed..
Our bowlers were on the mark, Dilip and Neil, mesmerized the top and middle order batsmen with their bounce, seam and pace, leaving them struggling with 3/4 wickets down and the asking rate starting to get out of hand.. Then came our trump card, Ayazuddin KHAN.... He got on top of the batsmen and stayed on top beating them black and blue, with his crafty leg breaks and his quick and accurate straighter balls, it was a treat to watch from behind the stumps, and from the other end, Sanat choked up the runs and left the batsmen clueless at times with his quickish off spin, and they tried to go after his bowling but he bowled intelligently to grab 3 wickets in an over, just missing out on a hat trick, in the process.... Akshay and Nagesh performed the final rites and Anthony bowled the last over to take us to victory, by 30 odd runs......
Although we put up a good total on this wicket, I think the credit goes to the bowlers for bowling the tight lines that they did and keeping the opposition from scoring quickly.... Great start to the weekend, lot more action coming up next week, stay tuned....
I think by far Ayaz is the find of this season and although he didn't get a chance to bat today, he bowled very well and in particular one leg spinning beauty, that gave him a wicket, the way it came out of his hand looked very similar to a wicket taking delivery bowled by none other than Shane Warne....