This was by far, the best ground I've played on in the last two years or so of my cricketing career….
Fantastic victory in today's game that we played at PDTSA Cricket Ground in Boisar, noteworthy performances by Neil, Mayank, Gautam and Rizwan with the ball and our Captain Niket along with Sashwat, Akash and Neil with the bat, other batsmen too played very well to take the team home.... well bowled, well fielded, well batted and well played to the whole team.... and might I say again FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS ground....
To those who missed out on playing at this FABULOUS ground.... you definitely missed a treat....
First up I want to commend Niket for organising this match at the PDTSA Ground, that although was so far away that maybe some had thoughts of backing out from, but as we discovered later was well worth the drive, I personally got a feel of how an international outfield might be like, and although the opportunity did not come, it would have been well worth diving esp while fielding and also batting during the match.... secondly I want to commend everyone who took the chance of driving/traveling all the way to play on this FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS cricket ground.... for that effort itself I think everyone, including the opposition (although they turned up 1.30 hrs late....), deserves a 'MAN(s) of the MATCH' award.... thank you everyone for their presence........
I guess we all had an early start to the day... I myself was so excited about playing at the PDTSA Ground, having seen the photos of it few days ago.... I woke up around 5am and as I got ready, I also had the honor of giving a wake up call to our cricketing all rounder, yes the crown prince himself.... if you haven't got it yet, our Chief Information Officer, Ayaz Malik will be happy to shed some light on the same.... Anyways, we left bandra around and reached Andheri, where Akash picked us up and we were on the way to the ground.... enroute we encountered many Jugal-look-alikes as they raced past us at break-peck speeds, I say that, as they gave an impression of going fast but ended up going slightly fast if not slow.... kind of like someone saying that he/she went for a run, when all eye-witness accounts 'said' that he/she was 'Merely Slow-JOGGING'.... we reached at the ground at around 9am and at first sight were thrilled to be playing on such a well leveled outfield which had a leafy green color look to it.. every cm of it.... I guess that it helped that the ground was close to a water reservoir....
Our other team members reached the ground soon after and we were all ready to play by around 10, but the majority of the opposition team reached around 10.20 and we could only start the game at around 10.30am....
We lost the toss and were asked to bowl.... which was not to our teams liking and to be frank, I remember in the team discussion, I was the only one to suggest that the ball would definitely do a bit in the first few overs and given the good quality of the ball and our bowlers we could even pull that advantage to about 20 overs.... but that idea was disregarded and we thankfully we lost the toss and we bowled.... Neil and Rizwan started our bowling with Neil bowling an immaculate and highly accurate line and length to the batsmen.. of the 7 overs he bowled, he gave away 17 runs and bowled 36 dot balls and out of these, he maybe beat the batsmen (one in particular, the opener) 30 odd times, the quality of the ball.... combined with the quality of the bowling ensured that the batsmen never gained an upper hand and maybe lost most of their confidence in the first 20 odd overs itself.... I think Neil is at the top of his bowling form and that's not good news for any batsman facing him....
Rizwan had a forgettable first over and bowled a 12 ball over, with 6 wides and if it had not been for the fantastic and at times acrobatic wicket keeping by Akash, throughout the match, we could well have been chasing a total of more than 250 runs.... I remember, I was standing close to a 2nd slip position and one ball in that 2nd over can straight at me and Akash dived to his right and came up with it.... that's some serious wickekeeping.... Rizwan was taken off and came back later towards the end of the innings and bowled a wonderful spell and kept the batsmen quiet when the slog was on.... a truly great comeback it was.... Chintu and Gautam also had a decent spell of bowling in between them and did a reasonably good job, keeping the scores in check.... in the middle overs, Mayank bowled a beautiful spell, he bowled to field and the captain also backed him up nicely by setting aggressive fields and to his credit Mayank didn't bowl any loose balls and ended up giving 32 in his spell of 7 overs.... As we were short of spinning options, I was asked to fill in and in the 31st over, I took 2 wickets and gave away only 3 runs, the next over although was a forgettable over with a 6 coming off the first ball and the next 2 balls which went straight to the fielder's posted on the boundary, were somehow allowed to go to the boundary and it eventually went for 22 runs.... we kept the total down to 226/5 in 35
I remember someone made a remark on the group that the target was maybe on the higher side.... and I also remembered that in our previous game, we had chased down a similar target, although we had 40 overs to chase it dowm….
We had ordered for lunch from a local restaurant - 'Silver Avenue' and they even sent us Fiber plates cups and SS spoons and also a waiter to serve the food, the owner himself came to the ground and supervised the 'lunch'.... I would definitely recommend this restaurant to anyone going there.... The quality of food was also very nice
We started our chase with myself and Sitanshu as openers.... the opposition captain set a very aggressive field with 3 slips and a gully, a packed off side field.... first ball of the innings was a good length ball slightly outside the off stump and I just lent into it and punched it in the gap between cover and point, I didn't know how well I'd hit it till I saw the ball racing away to the boundary.... the next few balls were bowled at good length on the stumps and I was happy to defend them.... the next over was bowled by bowler, with a slinging action, very Malinga like and the ball was also very quick.... Sitanshu was on strike for that over and although he nicked one first up and was put down by the keeper, he played the rest of the balls quite well, letting alone one or two of them.. the next over I saw the bowler (who had a long run up, the same one who bowled the first over....) rolling the fingers onto the ball.... I took him for a boundary, a two the next ball and then another boundary towards midwicket.... I think having seen how the ball was moving around in our innings and the huge number of extras we gave away, they thought it was better to not let the ball swing too much and bowl one side of the wicket and keep the runs/scoring shots down.... but maybe they disregarded our counterattacking abilities.... with the score at 14/0 in 3, The next over we got 8 runs and the score started to move on.... they brought in a bowling change from the other end with a Hashim Amla look'alike skiddy kind of bowler, again I hit a couple of boundaries and a two, Sitanshu was on strike for the next over and the bowler who bowled the first over, switched ends to bowl from this one.... Sitanshu this time advanced down the track and hit him for back to back boundaries and got me on strike, and out of nowhere, I had a lapse in concentration and played a halfhearted lofted shot to a slower ball and only managed to scoop it high at mid-on where the fielder took a decent catch.... I was kicking myself for the next few minutes, for having thrown it away.... Akash came in next and just as he was settling in, Sitanshu got out to a good 'caught and bowled' to the same bowler who got me out.... suddenly from 42/0 in the 6th over, we were reduced to 50/2 in 8th....
Sashwat joined Akash in the middle and the spinners came on.... something we missed in our innings maybe, but to our defence, we didn't have any full time spinners.... Akash and Sashwat settled in nicely and started milking the bowlers for runs, esp Akash, who played such a well-controlled and crafty innings.... he didn't play a false shot in his entire innings and to my mind deserved a 50, but he got out to a ball that held up on the pitch and he was almost through his shot when it arrived and he ended up giving a gentle catch back to the bowler.... yes, the same one who opened the innings in their batting and played and missed more than 30 balls from Neil.... Sashwat didn't waste much time in defending the ball and went for his shots almost every opportunity but although the shots had a good sound to them.... the ball barely made it towards the boundary and he got 3 or 4 lives, two of which went for a 6 and a 4.... he rode his luck a bit too much and got out just when we were getting in control of the game.... Niket came in a bit earlier and had a nice bit of partnership with Akash till Akash was out as mentioned earlier.... at 136/4 the match was nicely poised with Niket who was already in his groove having played some nice cover drives and off drives.... Neil joined him in the middle and suddenly the scoring rate went up.... both of them started attacking the bowlers and before they knew what hit them, the game was almost gone.... sitting pretty at 209/4 in 29th Niket retired, in trying to give everyone a chance to bat.... Akshay was in next and was out bowled first ball the next ball a single and suddenly Neil was out LBW again, 210/6.... Rizwan was the next batsman in and after taking a single of the first ball, he too got out LBW, maybe playing back to a ball he should have played forward to.... and when Vipul was given out LBW, we were in dire straits 220/8 with 7 runs to win and many overs left.... Some drama followed which I would prefer better to not mention and Niket, who had retired earlier came back and played a delightful cover drive to complete his 50 and take us to victory........ a well-deserved end to the match....
Kudos to the whole team, well bowled, well fielded, well batted and Well Played
I think there were 2 important partnerships in our batting, one between Akash and Sashwat and the second one between Niket and Neil, that swung the match our way.... but more than anything it was the bowling and fielding that made the chase possible.... as a batsman I know how much of a task it is chasing a total close to 300 and a par score like this one.... thank you for a truly wonderful game of cricket.... see you next time
Fantastic victory in today's game that we played at PDTSA Cricket Ground in Boisar, noteworthy performances by Neil, Mayank, Gautam and Rizwan with the ball and our Captain Niket along with Sashwat, Akash and Neil with the bat, other batsmen too played very well to take the team home.... well bowled, well fielded, well batted and well played to the whole team.... and might I say again FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS ground....
To those who missed out on playing at this FABULOUS ground.... you definitely missed a treat....
First up I want to commend Niket for organising this match at the PDTSA Ground, that although was so far away that maybe some had thoughts of backing out from, but as we discovered later was well worth the drive, I personally got a feel of how an international outfield might be like, and although the opportunity did not come, it would have been well worth diving esp while fielding and also batting during the match.... secondly I want to commend everyone who took the chance of driving/traveling all the way to play on this FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS FABULOUS cricket ground.... for that effort itself I think everyone, including the opposition (although they turned up 1.30 hrs late....), deserves a 'MAN(s) of the MATCH' award.... thank you everyone for their presence........
Our other team members reached the ground soon after and we were all ready to play by around 10, but the majority of the opposition team reached around 10.20 and we could only start the game at around 10.30am....
We lost the toss and were asked to bowl.... which was not to our teams liking and to be frank, I remember in the team discussion, I was the only one to suggest that the ball would definitely do a bit in the first few overs and given the good quality of the ball and our bowlers we could even pull that advantage to about 20 overs.... but that idea was disregarded and we thankfully we lost the toss and we bowled.... Neil and Rizwan started our bowling with Neil bowling an immaculate and highly accurate line and length to the batsmen.. of the 7 overs he bowled, he gave away 17 runs and bowled 36 dot balls and out of these, he maybe beat the batsmen (one in particular, the opener) 30 odd times, the quality of the ball.... combined with the quality of the bowling ensured that the batsmen never gained an upper hand and maybe lost most of their confidence in the first 20 odd overs itself.... I think Neil is at the top of his bowling form and that's not good news for any batsman facing him....
Rizwan had a forgettable first over and bowled a 12 ball over, with 6 wides and if it had not been for the fantastic and at times acrobatic wicket keeping by Akash, throughout the match, we could well have been chasing a total of more than 250 runs.... I remember, I was standing close to a 2nd slip position and one ball in that 2nd over can straight at me and Akash dived to his right and came up with it.... that's some serious wickekeeping.... Rizwan was taken off and came back later towards the end of the innings and bowled a wonderful spell and kept the batsmen quiet when the slog was on.... a truly great comeback it was.... Chintu and Gautam also had a decent spell of bowling in between them and did a reasonably good job, keeping the scores in check.... in the middle overs, Mayank bowled a beautiful spell, he bowled to field and the captain also backed him up nicely by setting aggressive fields and to his credit Mayank didn't bowl any loose balls and ended up giving 32 in his spell of 7 overs.... As we were short of spinning options, I was asked to fill in and in the 31st over, I took 2 wickets and gave away only 3 runs, the next over although was a forgettable over with a 6 coming off the first ball and the next 2 balls which went straight to the fielder's posted on the boundary, were somehow allowed to go to the boundary and it eventually went for 22 runs.... we kept the total down to 226/5 in 35
I remember someone made a remark on the group that the target was maybe on the higher side.... and I also remembered that in our previous game, we had chased down a similar target, although we had 40 overs to chase it dowm….
We had ordered for lunch from a local restaurant - 'Silver Avenue' and they even sent us Fiber plates cups and SS spoons and also a waiter to serve the food, the owner himself came to the ground and supervised the 'lunch'.... I would definitely recommend this restaurant to anyone going there.... The quality of food was also very nice
We started our chase with myself and Sitanshu as openers.... the opposition captain set a very aggressive field with 3 slips and a gully, a packed off side field.... first ball of the innings was a good length ball slightly outside the off stump and I just lent into it and punched it in the gap between cover and point, I didn't know how well I'd hit it till I saw the ball racing away to the boundary.... the next few balls were bowled at good length on the stumps and I was happy to defend them.... the next over was bowled by bowler, with a slinging action, very Malinga like and the ball was also very quick.... Sitanshu was on strike for that over and although he nicked one first up and was put down by the keeper, he played the rest of the balls quite well, letting alone one or two of them.. the next over I saw the bowler (who had a long run up, the same one who bowled the first over....) rolling the fingers onto the ball.... I took him for a boundary, a two the next ball and then another boundary towards midwicket.... I think having seen how the ball was moving around in our innings and the huge number of extras we gave away, they thought it was better to not let the ball swing too much and bowl one side of the wicket and keep the runs/scoring shots down.... but maybe they disregarded our counterattacking abilities.... with the score at 14/0 in 3, The next over we got 8 runs and the score started to move on.... they brought in a bowling change from the other end with a Hashim Amla look'alike skiddy kind of bowler, again I hit a couple of boundaries and a two, Sitanshu was on strike for the next over and the bowler who bowled the first over, switched ends to bowl from this one.... Sitanshu this time advanced down the track and hit him for back to back boundaries and got me on strike, and out of nowhere, I had a lapse in concentration and played a halfhearted lofted shot to a slower ball and only managed to scoop it high at mid-on where the fielder took a decent catch.... I was kicking myself for the next few minutes, for having thrown it away.... Akash came in next and just as he was settling in, Sitanshu got out to a good 'caught and bowled' to the same bowler who got me out.... suddenly from 42/0 in the 6th over, we were reduced to 50/2 in 8th....
Sashwat joined Akash in the middle and the spinners came on.... something we missed in our innings maybe, but to our defence, we didn't have any full time spinners.... Akash and Sashwat settled in nicely and started milking the bowlers for runs, esp Akash, who played such a well-controlled and crafty innings.... he didn't play a false shot in his entire innings and to my mind deserved a 50, but he got out to a ball that held up on the pitch and he was almost through his shot when it arrived and he ended up giving a gentle catch back to the bowler.... yes, the same one who opened the innings in their batting and played and missed more than 30 balls from Neil.... Sashwat didn't waste much time in defending the ball and went for his shots almost every opportunity but although the shots had a good sound to them.... the ball barely made it towards the boundary and he got 3 or 4 lives, two of which went for a 6 and a 4.... he rode his luck a bit too much and got out just when we were getting in control of the game.... Niket came in a bit earlier and had a nice bit of partnership with Akash till Akash was out as mentioned earlier.... at 136/4 the match was nicely poised with Niket who was already in his groove having played some nice cover drives and off drives.... Neil joined him in the middle and suddenly the scoring rate went up.... both of them started attacking the bowlers and before they knew what hit them, the game was almost gone.... sitting pretty at 209/4 in 29th Niket retired, in trying to give everyone a chance to bat.... Akshay was in next and was out bowled first ball the next ball a single and suddenly Neil was out LBW again, 210/6.... Rizwan was the next batsman in and after taking a single of the first ball, he too got out LBW, maybe playing back to a ball he should have played forward to.... and when Vipul was given out LBW, we were in dire straits 220/8 with 7 runs to win and many overs left.... Some drama followed which I would prefer better to not mention and Niket, who had retired earlier came back and played a delightful cover drive to complete his 50 and take us to victory........ a well-deserved end to the match....
Kudos to the whole team, well bowled, well fielded, well batted and Well Played
I think there were 2 important partnerships in our batting, one between Akash and Sashwat and the second one between Niket and Neil, that swung the match our way.... but more than anything it was the bowling and fielding that made the chase possible.... as a batsman I know how much of a task it is chasing a total close to 300 and a par score like this one.... thank you for a truly wonderful game of cricket.... see you next time
