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Match
Secretaries report on the inauguration of the Seattle Cup
NCCA hosted the North West Cricket League in the inauguration of what will hopefully become an annual tournament. It was played over the two day weekend of May 14 and 15, at the beautiful Kirigin Cellars Winery in Gilroy. NCCA emerged victorious on both days, although not without a few glitches along the way.
Saturday's game was played in blustery conditions which meant that the bails had to be removed on a number of occasions. The wind also contributed to a large number of wides, specially by the home team. NCCA won the toss and inserted the visitors.
An excellent opening spell by Saeed Ahmed and Sandeep Patel quickly reduced the visitors to 14 for 3. Saeed was specially hostile and caused some consternation before the wide bug struck. Sandeep continued to bowl with an excellent command of line and length and his variation of swing and speed caused trouble to all the batsmen. With the scoreboard reading 34 he produced another beautiful ball to dismiss last year's Regional Vice Captain, Bhargava Vadapalli. The visiting skipper, Mehul Dave and Sanjay Rama set about rescuing the situation and played a few attractive shots. The introduction of Nadeem Sheikh however brought about Mehul's downfall, when he played a rash shot and saw his stumps cart wheeling out of the ground, (73 for 5). Vijay Beniwal, another member of last year's successsful regional team then joined Sanjay and both took advantage of a few loose deliveries and a lot of wides from the change bowlers. Just when it seemed that these two would build a large score another rush of blood produced Sanjay's downfall. In attempting to charge Nadeem he only succeeded in lofting a catch to deep mid deep off. (111 for 6) A disappointing end to what had been a stylish and attractive innings. Vijay continued to strike a few lusty blows and aided by double figure scores from four of the tail enders the North West region lads revealed some vulnerability in the NCCA support bowlers. The innings finally wrapped up with a total of 199 in the 44th over.
Vijay opened the bowling for North West and struck an
immediate blow by inducing Sunny Singh to give a catch to the outfield. Fahad Altaf however was in sparkling form and, in addition to his favourite pulls, he produced some lovely off side shots and raced to 40, out of the total of 69. Mehul eventually produced an excellent ball which bowled Fahad in the 11th over but Nauman and Ozair continued to stroke the ball to all corners of the field. When the 17th over break was taken the score was already 111 for 2 and the hosts looked assured of an easy victory. North West did not go down without a fight however and in the second session they produced their best cricket of the weekend. The opening bowler Suresh Nair returned for a 2nd spell and disposed of Nauman, and good spells by several of the others, aided by tight fielding, restricted the NCCA and three wickets tumbled just before the 34th over break. At that point North West probably thought that they had a legitimate chance of victory but they didn't know that one of Northern California's most prolific batsmen had just entered the fray. Deep Singh Ghai gave them some hope with a couple of swings and misses but the pugnacious Punjabi soon found the range and it wasn't long before he was peppering the boundaries in characteristic style. Ganesh, for once, played a secondary but valuable role and contrived to give Deep most of the strike. A huge six and several 4's later the win was in the bag and Deep was voted man of the match by his colleagues.
Day 2 was warmer and much less windy and the North West skipper chose to field when winning the toss. Sunny launched a couple of massive sixes early in the proceedings but Mehul soon found the edge and wicket keeper Sanjay held the catch. Nirosh De Silva, hot off the plane from Sri Lanka, didn't last long and was surprisingly run out. Not a very common sight. Debutante Sunil Chandrupatla played a fine supporting role while Fahad, who was once again in excellent form displayed a mixture of superbly timed pulls over long on and stylish cuts and drives through the off side. Together they added 81 and when Fahad departed after scoring 71 (2 x 6 and 8 x 4) the scoreboard read 129 for 3 in the 22nd over. Sunil then assumed the lead role and himself produced a series of fine cuts and pulls to ring up another impressive 71. Akash didn't last long but again Ganesh contributed an important 22 and when the second session ended with the scoreboard reading 191 for 4 many in attendance were expecting a total close to 300. North West dug in their heels however and with Mehul, once again bowling well, and receiving good support from Vijay and Rajesh Ganesan, they restricted the NCCA to a total of 265 in 47.4
overs.
North West charged out of the traps with 36 off the first 6 overs before Sandeep removed opener Faisal Awan for 7 in the 7th over. His partner Naveen Kumar continued to bat
aggressively ( 2x 6, 4 x 4 ) but the introduction of Nirosh brought the charge to a screeching halt. Despite his lack of practice the amiable Sri Lankan fell
quickly into his rhythmic gait and runs became a scarce commodity. A couple of loose overs by Sandeep resurrected hope for the North west squad and the score again accelerated to 66 after 11 overs. At this point the worm turned when a brilliant pick up and throw by Fahad dismissed the dangerous Mehul. This superb piece of fielding cemented his selection as Man of the match and moments later Nirosh trapped Naveen (44) in front of the stumps. Meanwhile skipper Nana had shrewdly kept faith with Sandeep and his faith was rewarded by the dismissals in quick succession of Sanjay and Bhargava. Ganesh replaced the opener and added the wickets of Vijay and Rajesh and with Nirosh tightening the screws at the other end the score slumped to 92 for 7. Some token resistance by three of the tail enders was never a threat and the
innings ended with the score 144 in the 38th over.
Several awards were presented at the end of the proceedings. In addition to the Seattle Cup to NCCA led by Ozair Nana the following individual awards were given.
Best debutante:
Sunil Chandrupatla
Best bowler: Mehul Dave
Best Batsman: Fahad Altaf
Most Valuable Player: Fahad Altaf
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