Ghatkopar Jets stun City Riders to win Mitsui Shoji Tournament 2015
Venue : Mumbai Police Gymkhana Cricket Ground Mumbai | Match Scorecard | Tournament Details
City Riders: 175 All out in 19.2 overs (Shahid 56, Almeda 38, Akhter 3/35, Aashish 2/25)
Ghatkopar Jets: 179/4 in 18.3 overs (Sarvesh 71, Swapnil 64, Santosh 2/30, Shahid 1/21)
Report:
This might not be comparable with India’s 1983 victory against the mighty West Indies, but despite being categorized as underdogs and odds stacked against them, Ghatkopar Jets have won the prestigious Mitsui Shoji Tournament 2015 and that too in style. They won by 6 wickets against a team whom they had failed to beat twice in the same tournament previously. But they won when it mattered the most- in the final. It was a comprehensive victory, to say the least.
Ghatkopar Jets won the toss and sent the tournament favourites- City Riders to bat first despite being smashed by them for the highest score of the tournament previously. Riders lost Jay Bishta early but Almeda continued from where he had left in the semi-final. He smashed the bowlers all over the park and scored a whirlwind 38 from just 18 balls. Ghatkopar were lucky to have got his wicket soon otherwise he would have created havoc for a longer duration. Next three batsmen also played well and got their team into a good position. No. 3 Shahid Shaikh was in devastating form and scored 56 runs off just 27 balls. City Riders were looking for yet another 200 plus total with 150 runs on the board in the 16th over and 7 wickets in hand. Semi-final hero Santosh Shinde was yet to arrive at the crease. It was the perfect platform for him to explode and get his team to a winning total.
But Akhter Shaikh came on to bowl the 16th over and the game turned on its head. He got Vinayak on the second ball and Santosh Shinde was run out on the third. This enabled Ghatkopar Jets to pull back the innings and they picked up some quick wickets and City Riders could not capitalize the slog overs. They were bundled out for 175, let alone score 200.
Akhter Shaikh was the pick of the bowlers, scalping 3 wickets. He got good support from Vaibhav Mali and Aashish More.
After restricting the opponents to a below par score, at least by their standards, Ghatkopar Jets were instilled with some confidence of chasing down the total. Their top order responded with the same spirit and despite losing Akhter Shaikh very early, Swapnil and Sarvesh took the attack to the opposition and scored at more than 9 runs per over for a partnership that lasted for 102 runs and 65 balls. This almost sealed the match for Ghatkopar Jets. Sarvesh continued the chase with Jaydeep and took the score past 150. Although they lost 2 quick wickets but they were well within the striking distance of chasing the total and winning the cup. Yogesh Pawar did not let the top order effort get wasted and did the finishing touches by scoring an unbeaten 10 ball 23.
City Riders, already ruing the fact that they let the game slip away in the last five overs of their batting, were carted by Ghatkopar batsmen and could not really come back into the game after that. Neither could they pick wickets nor stop the flow of runs. Only Santosh Shinde could pick up 2 wickets but more was required to defend the target.
Following awards were given in the presentation ceremony, in the presence of Former India International, Dilip Vengsarkar:
Man Of the Match: Sarvesh Damle (71 runs), Ghatkopar Jets
Best Batsman: Shashank Singh (417 runs in 9 matches), Shivaji Park Warriors
Best bowler: Santosh Shinde (14 wickets), Mumbai Police City Riders Skipper
Man of the series: Akash Parkar, Mumbai Police City Riders
Best player: Ajinkya Belonshe, Ghatkopar Jets skipper)
Captains Corner:
Ajinkya, Ghatkopar Jets: “The decision to field first was a good one. Bowlers did great job and fielding was also good. We kept our cool when City Riders were batting well but some good bowling changes worked for us. They fell short of about 35 runs, the way they were going. Out batsmen made the chase look easy. All credit to our team. I also thank them for giving me the captaincy as we had lost first few of our league matches and we had a point to prove.”
Santosh Shinde, City Riders: “We batted well but could not finish well. Our bowling was also not up to the mark. Dropped catches added to our woes. Congratulations to Ghatkopar. They played really well and deserve the cup.”
About the Tournament: Mitsui Shoji Tournament is a very popular tournament in Mumbai organized by Mumbai Cricket Club. Five teams participated in the 2015 edition with Twister and Sagar Samit International as the main Sponsors of the tournament.
We hope that you enjoyed the tournament as much as we did while covering it. We promise to come back soon with the next edition of the tournament.
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Match Report by:
Sumanyu Jain
Regional Manager & Editor @CricketGraph