Played between ICICI Sports Club and K.Jamnadas Sports Club, ICICI team opting to bat first posted a record total of 568/3 in mere 40 overs. Opener Nikhil Mandavkar went all guns blazing as he went on to score a massive 200 in 156 balls hitting 26 fours and 6 sixes. Nikhil stitched a 120 run opening stand with Kuldeep P (52).
Nikhil also got an able partner in Kiran Bobade as both the players stitched a 251 stand together for the 2nd wicket to push their team to a very strong position. Kiran who came at no.3 was equally threatening towards the bowlers as he smashed 156* mere 72 balls smashing 25 fours and 2 sixes.
The opposition team Jamnadas Sports Club were all out for 95 runs on the back of some wonderful bowling by the ICICI bowlers.
Result- ICICI won the match by 473 runs
Islam Gymkhana batting first on their home ground posted a total of 261/9 in 70 overs. With openers falling early, it was their in-form Hashir once again playing the rescue act as he smashed his 2nd consecutive ton of Purshottam Shield. Coming at no.3, Hashir scored 104 off 168 balls ensuring his team reached a respectable total. Left arm spinner Akshay Darekar who has been amongst the wickets throughout the season once again impressed with bowling figures of 5/73 in 28 overs alongwith 8 maidens. Akshay who is an experienced first class cricketer certainly brought in his experience to the core,
Bhatnagar Sports Team in reply were all out for 214 runs, thanks to Islam Gymkhana’s classic off spinner Salman Khan troubling the batters with his tight bowling. Salman took 5/71 with 7 maidens in 19 overs plucking out important wickets helping his team win the game by 47 runs.
Played between DSP & Stup Consultants at the Chereshwar Club, Trombay, DSP batting first posted a mammoth total of 196/2 in 20 overs. Opening the innings, Hitesh Gujar smashed the highest individual score as well as the fastest hundred of the Architects T20 Championship’20. Hitesh who is in terrific form and just fresh from a hundred a week back took on the bowlers with absolute domination hitting 13 fours and 6 sixes en-route his sizzling 132* off 68 balls. Hitesh also became one of the very few openers to bat from start to end in the tournament. Hitesh on the back of his excellent form with the bat also won the Automotive Corporate”Orange Cap” for the month of December’19.
Stup Consultants in reply managed to score only 135/8 in 20 overs with Husain Jariwala’s 45 being the highest score. The bowlers did an excellent job with Ganesh Patil (3/20), Jayesh Tandel (2/9) and Rakesh Patil (2/16) proving excellent with the ball.
Result-DSP won by 61 runs, Hitesh Gujar declared “Man of the Match”
Esplanade Liberals batting first at Azad Maidan posted a total of 209/10 in 43.1 overs on the back of Harshal Gaiwkad’s 77 off 90 balls at no.4. From the bowlers-Jash, Shivam and Shubham bagged 2 wkts each.
Defending a total of 210, it was their young spinner Harsh Shah who provided crucial breakthroughs and created a positive momentum for his team. Lord North Brook CC were cleaned up for 90 runs, courtesy Harsh Shah who came up with excellent bowling figures of 5/18 in 9 overs alongwith a maiden. Harsh also got good support from Rajan Gupta who took 3/25 in 4.5 overs.
By far one of the most exciting matches so far of the AT20 Season 8, it was between HSA Challengers and VK Architects at the Chereshwar Club Trombay. HSA opting to bat first suffered a batting collapse getting all out for 105 runs in 16.4 overs. As Anshul Gupta (Team Member) said, “the wicket was good to bat on, the bowling was good too, but it was our shots selection to be honest which led to collapse from 69/3 to 105/10” a total which is always trickier to defend in the T20 Format. From HAS, Rohan Nhaide (29) and Kuldeep Negi (21) were the highest scorers while Abhijeet Bhandwalkar came up with the best bowling figures of the tournament so far with 5/32 in 4 overs.
However, HSA not being the team to give up, their skipper Ravikant pumped up the boys & all is definitely not lost was the message passed on to the players!
With adrenaline high and a low score to defend, HSA were off to a magical start taking the wicket of VK’s skipper & strike batsman SP Patil for a duck. The momentum was created and wickets kept on tumbling with the match eventually becoming a last over thriller where Anshul being handed over the ball for the penultimate over with just a run to win and 2 wickets in hand.
In the final over, VK architects got a run out on 1st ball, courtesy their skipper Ravikant and then followed a couple of dot balls followed by a brilliant stumping by Kuldeep Negi which turned the game around and the match ended in a draw.
Into the super over, VK Architects could only muster 4 runs for the loss of 2 wkts in super over as their strike bowler Sagar Jadhav proved to be spot on. In reply, HSA won the match with Anshul scoring the winning 3 runs of 2balls. The match turned out to be a thriller much like England-NZ finals where both the teams were on edge and could not make out who will win till the very last over!
Result-HSA win the super over, Sagar Jadhav (2/10 in 4 overs & a tight super over) declared “Man of the Match”
Played between Datamatics Global and FCI (Food Corporation of India) at the Mahim Juvenile wicket in Dadar, Datamatics after being put to bat first posted a big total of 441/9 in 44 overs. Yogesh Shinde coming at no.3 top scored for his team hitting a quickfire 134 off mere 92 balls. Yogesh meant business out there hitting 17 boundaries and a six with a strike rate of close to 150.00! Apart from him, senior players like Rohidas Koyade (60), Rasik Naik (49) & Manoj Sonawane (34) chipped in with crucial knocks to put Datamatics in command.
The opposition team in reply were all out for 32 runs with Ritesh Palav taking 3 wkts for 5 runs in 3 overs being the pick of the lot. Datamatics bowlers were spot on keeping the opposition batters in check as they clinched a big victory by 411 runs.
THE TIMES CRICKET SHIELD: The match between Mahindra logistics Ltd and Sony pictures network private ltd was played at Oval maidan on 11th January 2020. Sony networks won the toss and elected to FIELD first.
Mahindra logistics had a decent start and Opener Amar Narkar continued his purple patch in batting. Ankit Nandoskar and Pratik Lad scored decent 30’s in the middle but the star of the day was Amar. Initially negating the good bowling and also punishing the bad deliveries, he scored a magnificent century and ended up scoring 118 runs off 132 deliveries. He had a solid partnership with Venkat Ingle (42 off 36) that paved the way to a total of 293 runs in 45 overs. Sony bowlers put in their valiant efforts but failed to restrict the opposition to put up a big total. However, Chinmay Mungerkar picked up 3 wickets for 66 runs in 8 overs.
Sony networks also put up a good show with the bat and were very competent I the middle. Opener Pratik patil (88 off 97) and no.4 Vishal Pandey (75 off 60) played exceedingly well and at one point they had the upper hand. At 210, Pratik got out and then they couldn’t recover to chase the target and eventually were bowled out for 251 runs losing 9 wickets. The pick of the bowlers for Mahindra logistics was left arm spinner Abhisek Pandey who picked up a figure of 3-43 in 9 overs. Overall, it was a good game of cricket.
Result – Mahindra Logistics won by 42 runs.
Played between Tata Power and Jaslok Hospital at the High Court, Oval Maidan, Jaslol Hospital after being put to bat first were all out for 192 runs in 44.1 overs. It was a clinical bowling performance from the Tata Power players with skipper Wilkin Mota being the pick of the lot with 3/15 in 9 overs alongwith 1 maidens. Bhooshan Kastur & all-rounder Rohan Bane also bagged 2 wkts each.
Chasing 193, Tata Power made it look like a cakewalk thanks to their seasoned campaigners Rohan Bane and Wilkin Mota. Rohan opening the innings scored a quickfire 96 off 71 balls (13 fours, 1 six) laying the foundation for the chase while Wilkin Mota who came at no.4 remained unbeaten on 65* off 60 deliveries (8 fours) as both the batsmen stitched a match winning partnership together sealing off the chase in mere 25.3 overs.
Wilkin Mota who is a former First Class and IPL cricketer while Rohan who is an equally prolific player with years of experience in Club Cricket brought in their rich experience together to help Tata Power stay in command.
Result-Tata Power won the match by 7 wkts
MIG opting to bat first at Karnatak Wicket, Cross Maidan dominated the opposition on their home turf hitting 379/8 in 70 overs. With both the openers falling early, it was Swapnil Pradhan (40) & Gaurav Jathar holding fort with a 72 run stand for the 3rd wicket. With MIG gaining momentum, the stage was set for the aggressive Swapnil Salvi to play his natural game as he went on to score a quick 124 off 102 balls laced with 9 fours & 7 sixes. Swapnil also received good support from their inform Gaurav Jathar (84) with whom he stitched a 171 run partnership for the 4th wicket. From KSA, Prathamesh Dake who took a fifer in his previous outing was again the pick of the lot coming up with 6/106 in 17 overs.
Karnatak Sporting Association who boast of an equally promising line up were troubled on their home wicket thanks to a fantastic spell by spinner Ankush Jaiswal who turned the game with a crucial spell of 7/91 in 21.2 overs. Ankush provided with wickets at the right intervals as Karantak Sporting Association despite a solid opening start by their openers Shrideep Mangela (65) & Aman Jain (44) were all out for 227 runs in 48.2 overs.
What if we tell you there is a batsman who is performing at present with a batting average of 100.00+! The batsman in contention is none other than Harmesh Somaiya . Harmesh started the season with a brilliant century in Times Shield for Western Railways team. However, his good patch just didn’t end there, Harmesh who was a part of SPL (Saurashtra Premier League’19) last season decided to give it a one more shot to get back to form as he participated in the Inter District Jai Hind Trophy 2019-20.
In the 6 matches & 11 innings which Harmesh played this season in the Inter District Jai Hind Trophy, Somaiya notched up a record 767 runs with a batting average of 109.57. Representing Rajkot Division Sports Association Team as well as Rajkot Railways team, Harmesh smashed 3 centuries, 1 double century & 2 half centuries with a best score of 204* in 11 innings.
Since the last few years he has been amongst the runs across various tournaments & if his current form is anything to go by, he looks all prepared to make a comeback to competitive cricket again.
His Stats in Jai Hind Trophy (Inter District)
- Matches-6
- Innings-11
- 50’s-2
- 100’s-4
- Runs-767
- Average-109.57
- Best-204*