Interleague Tournaments Match Report: SCA vs BACA April 3 2010
On a cold morning, Sacramento Cricket Association (SCA) won the toss and invited Bay Area Cricket Alliance (BACA) to bat first in wet conditions. BACA lost Snehal early to a doubtful caught behind decision off the bowling of Bilal Hussein and Ashok joined Kulwant to settle the early nerves. While Kulwant played himself in, Ashok played some meaty and monstrous hits particularly to the onside area and ball was lost on couple of occasions. They stitched together a quick partnership of 85 in 15 overs before Ashok fell to Kulvinder, brilliantly caught by SCA keeper Sukhjit for quick 51 off 43 balls with 4 hits to the fence and couple over it. BACA lost Kulwant to swift throw from deep wicket by Arif taking their score to 97/3 at the break in 18 overs. Amjad was joined by Amir at the crease and the two settled in with singles and doubles. Amjad took on the spin attack of SCA by launching some beautiful hits to both sides of the wicket. BACA lost Amir against the run of play when he was adjudged run out in a bizarre fashion with no appeal from the fielding side when the batsmen seem to make his ground comfortably. Meanwhile Amjad raced to his fifty in 45 balls and decided to cut loose while bringing up BACA 150 in 28 overs. Amjad put his foot on the pedal bringing up his second fifty off another eighteen balls and his overall hundred took a mere 68 balls. He cleared the fences 7 times and also had four boundaries. He was particularly severe with his pull shot and played couple of crisp drives for sixes over extra cover as well. He was well supported by Ranvir (22 with 2 sixes) for his second fifty run partnership and third for team BACA in this innings. BACA lost couple of quick wickets in the middle order but the lower order particularly Mayank (22 not out) played sensibly to ensure they played out their quota of overs. BACA ended at the score of 294 before getting bowled out with couple of deliveries to go. Tariq Zaman was the pick of the bowling attack with figures of 3/37 and keeper Sukhjit took 3 catches and 1 run out.
SCA made a quiet start to their chase with Ifthikar and Bantu starting out with maidens and both batsmen were not able to score freely and looked tentative. Kiran picked out Bantu at midwicket off Ifthikar’s bowling and Sukhjit joined Shahzad at the crease. Sukhjit sent couple of soaring sixes into the homes in the midwicket region bringing some life into the chase but could not clear Manjit on the cover boundary. Ifthikar was on fire by then trapping Shahzad in front, cleaning up last week’s centurion Tariq for 4 and castling Arif for 15 to leave SCA tottering at 76 for 5 at the drinks break at the 18th over. Kulvinder tried to take the attack up with a huge six and a four before BACA spinners Mayank & Amir struck twice each to bring the innings to quick close in the 29th inning for 112. Sukhjit (23), Kulvinder (17) and Arif (15) were only ones to put together some score for SCA. Ifthikar was outstanding for BACA with his 5 wickets for 35 run from his non stop spell of 10 overs. Ashok held 3 catches in the field and Bantu and Manjit bowled probing spells to support Ifthikar on the other end. Amjad Khan was adjudged man of the match for his blistering hundred that sent BACA with 2 points into the Super 4 phase of the NWR Interleague 2010. Thank to SCA for being a wonderful host and all the supporters on both sides who showed up to support their teams. Game was played in great spirits between the two teams.
Score Summary
BACA 294 all out in 49.4 overs ( Amjad Khan 101, Ashok Singh 51, Kulwant 28, Ranvir 22, Mayank 22 not out, Tariq Zaman 3/37)
SCA 112 all out in 29 overs (Sukhjit 23, Kulvinder 17, Arif 15, Ifthikar 5/35, Amir 2/3, Mayank 2/12)
