Marina CC 1 Vs. Golden CC - March 12th 2011

Match Report Marina CC Vs. Golden CC - March 12th 2011 - Saturday by Ganesh!

Dear Marinoids,

Its very nice to see M1 registering a 9 Points in their first game against Golden CC.

It was nice to see the boys coming in at 12 PM considering its their first league game and practicing at the nets. We have a good fielding drill and we came to know how stiff we were on the field especially as regards to throwing. Sushanth bore the brunt of wild throws from likes of Sri, Shan, Redy and our new found talent Cleti!

But that was necessary so as to light up the fielding and opening our eyes to our bowling.

As usual Sri lost the toss and Golden CC opted to bat first on a hot and sunny day. We were looking forward to batting first but since it was a turf wicket at Kallang it was a blessing in disguise that Sri lost the loss.

Bowling & Fielding

It was the first game of the season with the pitch and we didn’t know how it will play.

Prabhu started off the bowling session with a short ball which didn’t rise as much as he had expected to be flicked to short fine leg for a single. We knew if you ball wicket to wicket you had every chance of picking up a wicket.

We had a good first over from Prabhu with only 3 runs off it. Then Shan started at the other end, he was getting a slight swing due to the breeze and was wicket to wicket to start off with.

Great disciplined bowling had our first breakthrough by Prabhu getting the opening LBW.

Shan also got his first LBW victim in his next over.

All in all a very good start by the opening bowlers, Golden CC was on the back foot at 25 for 2 in 6 overs.

Then Sri introduced Shriram into the attack at the 7^th Over from Prabhu’s end. He got the first breakthrough bowled neck and crock!

He was in a very good rhythm generating good pace and directed at the stumps. Unfortunately at the beginning of 4^th over he had a severe Cramp which forced him out of his bowling. He didn’t offer any width to the batsman and was express pace. A new found talent for M1 pace bowling attack! Ganesh completed his over with a tight spell giving away one run from his 4 balls over.

Cletus came in post Shan’s spell. He was very wicket to wicket but couldn’t get under the wicket column. He can be a real asset for marina when it comes to Bowling and batting.

Sri managed to pickup one wicket when Ismat tried to whack a full toss over mid wicket for a six, safely grabbed by Cletus at the deep!

Bowler of the day was Arun, he is a genuine wicket taker & he surely understands his responsibility in the team. Golden CC was struggling due to his performance, they were 9 down for 86 runs. Arun grabbed 4 wickets with two wickets coming off full tosses.

Redkar grabbed 1 wicket, caught safely by Sushanth, Chandru bowled well, but couldn’t get a breakthrough.

Marina struggled to get the last wicket and there was  a partnership of 52 runs in 16 overs. Golden CC ended with respectable 138 All out in 36 overs. 

Captain should rethink giving leg spin option more in Division 2 matches, especially when leg spinners can get you wickets! He continued with Pace bowling option as he wanted his pace bowlers to get you wickets, they were easily negotiated by the last two batsmen and was able to singles at will.

A special mention to Prem who came in as a twelfth man, he dived around the field and almost took a blinder at covers diving at the front. His commitment is laudable and who would want to field only as a 12^th Man in this heat, that shows his commitment to marina and his love for this game!

At the end a decent bowling performance with no real blemishes on the field.

Bowling innings:

Prabhu: 4-1-17-1

Shan: 4-0-15-1

Shriram: 5.2-1-23-2

Arun: 5.2-0-20-4

Sri: 5-0-23-1

Redkar: 4-0-10-1

Chandru: 3-0-12-0

Cletus: 4-0-32-0

Ganesh: 0.4-0-1-0

Batting

Ganesh and Vignesh opened the batting for Marina. Ganesh didn’t trouble the scorers much, he got a good fully pitched up inswinger, kept low and hit the leg stump, he totally missed the line, he was out for 1!

Vignesh got a low bounce and was LBW for 3.

Prabhu looked good for his stay of 16 balls, with 2 fluent hard hitting boundaries, again becoming a victim of Leg before wicket, Kallang pitch had something to offer for bowlers who kept straight on the stumps!

Sushant and Shriram steadied the ship with a partnership of 25 runs, before Sushant got out LBW to the off spinner. He felt it was pitching outside leg stump.

Sushant was looking very fluent with his one’s and two’s. He also benefitted the team with the left hand right hand combination with wides being sprayed by the opposition although their bowling was still much disciplined.

Shriram looked good for his brief stay at the wicket, looked confident going on the back foot and front foot. Reminds me of right handed Brian Lara. He was again left in pain with cramps on this left thumb this time. Ganesh came out as a by runner for a brief stay before Shriram decided to get out of the field for recovery! He has got a good rest for his next match!

With Shriram’s retiring it brought Sri into the middle. Sri and Chandru played some very good shots on the off and on the leg side.

Sri was looking very fluent against the fast bowlers, they kept the momentum going with singles and doubles. Sri took hard toll on the leg spinner and lofted him over the midwicket for a big six! Sri scored 4 boundaries and 1 Six in his fluent innings of 37 off 41 balls.

Chandru too looked good in his solid stay at the wicket, He scored 3 boundaries and his cover drive to the fast bowler was the shot of match, nobody moved, it was just awesome timing…. He normally is known for his Natraja shot and lofted extra cover drive, but he looked very solid.

Very notable to see the partnership was 82 runs between Sri and Chandru at the fall of Sushant’s wicket, we were 57 for 4.

That partnership looked like an easy victory but believe me there were more demons in the wicket than what we thought, but Sri and Chandru made it look so easy!

The middle order let us down in the previous season and this was proved wrong this time.

Now its time for the Top order to step up the gas in the future matches, this team really looks formidable both in the batting and bowling! I hope they beat the top guns in the matches to come.

Go MaRiNa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ganesh: 1(7)

Vignesh: 3(6)

Prabhu: 15(16) (2 fours)

Sushant: 13(30)

Shriram: 12(22) retired

Sri: 37 (41) not out (4 fours and 1 six)

Chandru: 30 (49) not out (3 fours)

Man of the Match: Arun Bharadwaj

Marina 3 vs ANZA 2

Our first match for this season was against ANZA. We had a good outing against them last year, but this year we fell short by 20 odd runs.

Marina lost the toss and was asked to field first. Ankit K, playing his first match for Marina, started the bowling and created a chace in the very first over. However the catch was spilled at point by Ankit S. The missed catch resulted in a split webbing and a dislocated finger. He tried to field on for a while, but the swelling increased and he went to hospital to get it checked. He will be out of action for about a month....

Our bowling was pretty decent. We conceded 158 runs in 30 overs. This is a regulation score in turf city. Mags lead the bowling with 3 brilliant wickets...2 in his very first over. Prem took 2 wickets, 1 to Prasad and 1 to Ankit S. Pareet bhai was wicketless but bowled brilliantly throught the match. we had two runouts... so the final score was 158/9...a pretty decent show by the bowlers.

We were pretty confident of chasing down the target....but we kept losing wickets regularly. I was out in the second over. Prasad and Prem tried to bat steadily for a while, but prem was caught trying to clear the mid off. Wickets kept falling....prasad, swami...until KV and Yogi tried to put on a fight. They were going on well but the run rate kept creeping up. Ultimately both were out trying to clear the huge turf city boundary. This led to another mini collapse as Sai was caught for a duck.

But then we had a refeshing show of intelligent batting from Mags and Pareet. Both ran the singles well and kept the scoreboard moving. Maggie hit a few sixes towards the end, but the run rate was already beyond us. We lasted till the last over...but lost the match by 20 odd runs.

Mags was the star for us both with the bat and ball.

Ankit S's injury costed us quite a bit. We were a fielder short from the very first order and we missed out on a top order batsman. However 158 was very much chasable in turf city and we had the batting line up to chase that easily. But the familiar Marina collapse happened and we lost the macth.

Going forward we need to put a lot of effort in our preparation. This was our first match and may be some of us were rusty...but this can't be an excuse for our next macth. We have a decent 3 weeks break before our next game. I will try to arrange for NETs/Friendlies and I hope everyone is available for them.