Bowling for Commonwealth!!!

(By: Nafis Ahmad, Commonwealth C.C)

Date: July 17^th, 2004

Venue: Bedford, MA

Commonwealth Cricket Club (CCC) First XI played their first game of the season at their home field against United Athletics Association (UAA). It was a hot and humid day, perhaps a signal that summer in Boston has finally arrived.

Fazal lost the toss and predictably we were fielding against a side that packs more batting than bowling in their line up. Grantley Headley and Cossie Carter opened the innings for UAA. Cossie showed his good touch with the bat, dispatching the first ball of the match to square leg boundary. After the first couple of overs, Sameer settled down to a very good line and length, and started to trouble the batsmen, with pace, variation and a hint of swing. From the other end, Ghazanfer struggled to find his line, but he too settled down and produced some fine deliveries to trouble the batsmen. The first one to go was Headley (1), LBW to Ghazanfer. A. Massiah replaced Headley, but was tied down from both ends. Soon Sameer shifted gears and upgraded his bowling from good to devastating, where he became virtually unplayable in his last 3 overs, bowling three maidens on the trot. He finished with an impressive (8-3-23-1), claiming the wicket of Cossie Carter.

Ali replaced Sameer from the Golf Course End, and to the surprise of all, marked his runup as that of a medium pacer, and started to bowl medium pacers at a decent pace and a good accuracy. He captured the wicket of Massiah on a nippy delivery, well caught by Fazal in the slips, and continued to destroy UAA’s middle order with some fine medium pace bowling. He eventually finished with impressive figures of 6.4-1-18-5. Considering that it was his first attempt into this facet of the game, it was mind-boggling. UAA put up a total of 136 in 34.4 overs, owing largely to a good partnership between E Clarke (15) and Tom Dass (23). Both batsmen fell to good catches on the boundary line by Natraj and Ghazanfer respectively.

Basu and Fazal opened the batting as CCC started their chase. Fazal (23) played a few good shots, including a towering six at long off, but was caught at the boundary trying to repeat the shot. Basu was batting comfortably at 14, until he lost his wicket to a misjudged pull. At 46 for 2, Nafis joined Ali, who was having some problems negotiating the prodigious in-swing of J. Newton. There were some early jitters, as Ali survived a couple of vociferous appeals for LBW against J. Newton, but he eventually managed to cope with the bowler, and soon had him removed from the bowling after hitting him for 2 sixes on the square leg boundary. Both batsmen batted comfortably and moved the score along without any problems. J. Newton was brought back into the attack from the Golf Course End, but was now met with some disdain from Ali, who apparently in an effort to wipe out his early close calls, firmly dispatched Newton out of the ground for two more consecutive sixes. Ali perished to J Newton, on a top edge that ended up in the hands of Chris Okelo at deep square leg after scoring 40 runs.

Venkat joined Nafis and showed his talent with a couple of forceful boundaries. He (12) lost his wicket to Headley, and was replaced by Johnny Wright, who made his debut as a batsman in this game. Johnny appeared from the pavilion as a Junior Knight in Protective Armor, ready to take on the bowling. He managed to connect the ball on two occasions, scoring 2 runs, did not lose his wicket and featured in the match winning partnership for CCC. Johnny, Bravo!! Shortly, thereafter, Nafis (34) finished the game with a six over midwicket.

It was a comfortable 6 wicket win for CCC. The takeaways from the game were that with the arrival of summer, the days are hotter and the conditions more stifling. Players need to remain hydrated, and agile throughout the innings. We allowed UAA to score about 25 more runs than what they should have made, mainly due to tiring conditions. But all in all it was a good bowling and fielding effort, with Sameer producing a genuine spell of pace bowling. CCC gained depth in their pace bowling department, with Ali running in from 20 yards, instead of standing and delivering!! His five wickets haul was heartening and will have some interesting ramifications in the remaining games of the season.