Kevin Almeida’s steamy knock of 53 against quality IPL bowlers in DY Patil T20
It was the 2nd league match between two competitive sides namely DY Patil vs BPCL. Both the teams are strong & an exciting encounter was bound to happen between the two sides. Both the teams have big names too out of which many were also national level & IPL players.
BPCL had won the toss & elected to bat first. Right handed Eknath Kerkar gave a blazing start right from the first ball but unluckily he did not get much of a support from the rest of the batsman. Manish Pandey played well and got off to a start but could not convert his 26 ball 30 to a big one. BPCL managed to score 148/9 in 20 overs due to some fantastic bowling by the D.Y Patil bowlers. Shashank Singh & Gaurav Jathar contained the batsman while picking up a wicket each. Sarfaraz khan’s leg spin also bagged him two wickets in two overs.
Chasing 149, DY Patil were off to a shaky start but Kevin Almeida completely dominated the innings. DY patil lost 3 quick wickets until Kevin got a stable support from Rinku Singh whose cameo of 36 off just 31 balls played a very important role in scripting a win for DY. As Kevin’s team mate Subramaniam D shared with CricketGraph ‘Kevin is not only talented but he is a 360 degree batsman who has a wide range of shots, he plays aggressive cricket & at the same time knows when to take singles and two’s & he completely dominated in this game”
Left-handed Kevin Almeida who smashed the first ball he faced for a sixer scored 53 off just 29 balls which included 7 fours and 2 sixes at a strike rate of above 180. DY Patil won the match by just one wicket and they must be thankful to Almeida’s efforts at the top of the order. This knock of Kevin is all though more special since he scored aggressively against top-notch IPL bowlers like Sandeep Sharma,Kuldeep Yadav and Pragyan Ojha.
The victory wouldn’t have been possible without the midas touch of leggie Pravin Tambe who scored a six and 2 fours in a huge pressure situation . The entire DY Patil team acknowledged and saluted the cameo by Pravin Tambe.
Their next match is against Western railways and they will be aiming for a 3rd consecutive win in the 13th D.Y Patil tournament.