Sunday 10th of June was the 6th league match for VCC 2 playing away against Ghausia 2. It was a small football sized ground with the relative short boundaries, especially on the squares. Ghausia 2 won the toss and elected to bat first.
VCC bowlers Faisal and Sono started off decently, going for a run rate of 5 an over, but Ghausia’s batsmen were playing the balls on merit and waited for the bad balls. With a healthy run rate, they were also able to steal many quick singles, which ultimately caused pressure on the VCC fielders.
At drinks the score was 84 for 0 in 17 overs. After the drinks break the opposition tried to capitalize on their situation and started to attack the spinners, taking full advantage of the short boundaries.
Ghausia lost their first wicket in 20th over when left hander Amir tried to play cross the line to a good length googly bowled by Kashif, which was caught at deep square by Atif score at that time was 105 in 19 overs.
At this moment Azam batsman number 2 changed gears and started hitting the spinners freely he was finally caught on the bowling of Ayan after making 68 runs. It didn’t take long for the new batsmen to get set, as they started hitting the ball cleanly and effortlessly for boundaries almost every over. They were also supported by drop catches and misfields, putting pressure on the bowlers, with one batsmen being dropped 5 times, allowing him to reach 80 runs. Ghausia ended up with a total of 307 with 41 extras.
After lunch it was time for the batsmen to chase a 307. It was thought to be achievable due to shorter boundaries and good batting pitch.
Abbas and Kalyan started the innings but lost the first wicket of Kalyan on a loose shot with VCC 8 for 1. Abbas tried to be positive by hitting 3 boundaries, but got himself run out after a miss understanding with Aryan, as they were planning to use the same tactics as the opposition by taking those quick singles. At this point Ghausia bowlers were on top. But Floris and Aryan tried to stabilize the innings and put a good fighting partnership of 50 runs before Aryan was caught at 36. Floris continued his job by putting up another partnership with Alyan and scoring at a decent pace, however, after two quick strikes, Ghausia was on top once again. Looking to score another match winning inning, Sono and Atif showed some resistance, and after another solid start from VCC’s batsmen wickets fell once again. As the required run rate kept climbing, the batsmen had no choice but to play some aggressive shots. Altough being in vain, Faisel struck some big 6’s. At the end the target was too big to chase for the batsmen and VCC managed to score 237 in their 40 overs and loosing 8 of their wickets.
Though, the score was 300 plus, the bowlers bowled decently, but were met with better batsmen on the day, who capitalised on the short boundaries brilliantly. Most of VCC’s batsmen on the other hand, had good starts, but lost their wickets after being well set.
VCC’s batsmen will be looking to play longer innings in the games ahead and score more runs individually after being well set.
Atif Zaka
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Scorecard
