The CouchExpert Staff
21st April, 2013
Match: MMavericks Cricket Club (M.C.C) versus AMD
Venue: CECG, Bangalore
Toss: MCC won the toss and elected to bat.
Teams:
AMD in navy blue
M.C.C. in orange
The tournament kicked off in a fine fashion with the MCC openers Gunashekar and Shankar putting up a solid base against a sloppy AMD attack with only Ravi being able to peg the MCC openers slightly in the powerplay overs. A humid day meant, the early start not withstanding, the fielders and the batsmen would be testes with the long boundaries at the ground.
Guna’s game blossomed after a steady start and with Shankar paying handsome strokes at the other end the pair brought up 50 in the 7th over. Only Ravi seemed to be able to keep the batsmen in check and it was Ravi who eventually provided the breakthrough bowling Shankar with the score on 53 on the last ball of the 7th over.
It brought a belligerent Prasad to the crease. Prasad dominated the AMD bowlers with powerful drives and aggressive running between the wickets. The good start provided the powerful Shankar the freedom to go after the bowling and he did that with plundering success. Guru played second fiddle largely looking to put Prasad as much on strike as possible. The pairs plan paid rich dividents with them putting on 93 runs for the second wicket in just 10.1 overs.
The innings revolved around the 2nd wicket partnership with Gunashekar complementing the very aggressive Prasad (66 (38b, 9X4, 1X6)) by dropping anchor and eventually helping his team to get to 179 at the end of 20 overs. “The ground is big and it is humid. It is a test of fitness. I was cramping in the end. Thanks to the support from Prasad and Shankar, we were able to put up a big score,” said Gunashekar at the end of the game. A sentiment that was acknowledged by his captain Venu as well. AMD’s captain seemed disappointed with his team’s fielding that he termed to be “poor” but hoped to absorb the experience and defend better at the big ground in the next games.
Guna’s unbeaten 70 powered MCC to 179 in 20 overs
MCC threw in a surprise by opening with the left-arm spin of Vijay in the 2nd over that paid immediate results with him trapping AMD’s Viswajeet in his first over. AMD recovered well with the very impressive Karthik (30 (22b, 5X4)) counter-attacking MCC with fluent drives and cuts. Whilst he was at the crease, AMD seemed very much capable of mounting an assault to challenge MCC’s imposing total. Losing Vikas’s wicket in the 9th over with the score at 55 meant AMD had to consolidate without taking risks for a while.
AMD’s captain Prashanth (21 (19b, 2X4)) and Kiran (34 (23b, 4X4)) added a quick-fire 55 for the 4th wicket in 6 overs and the chase seemed to be very much back on track before Prashanth was undone by Suman and the chase folded with AMD being bowled up for 134 giving MCC a victory by 44 runs.
Scoring patterns for the two teams:
Full Scorecard
1st Inning Batting: MMavericks Cricket Club, MCC
R B 4's 6's SR
Shankar b Ravi 16 25 2 0 64.0
Gunashekar not out 70 54 9 0 129.63
Prasad c Vikas b Anil 66 38 9 1 173.68
Chetan not out 6 4 0 0 150.0
Extras(w 16, b 4, lb 1) 21
Total (2 wickets; 20.0 overs) 179 8.95 RPO
Did Not Bat:
Suman, Syed, Vijay, Venugopal, Ankit, Sunil, Bhargav
Fall of Wicket: 53-1 ( Shankar 6.6 ov ), 53-2 ( Shankar 6.7 ov ), 146-3 ( Prasad 17.1 ov )
1st Inning Bowling: AMD, AMD
O M R W EC AV EX
Arun 2.0 0 23 0 11.50 - (w 4)
Chetan 4.0 0 20 0 5.00 - (w 1)
Ravi 4.0 0 29 1 7.25 14.50 (w 1)
Karthik 1.0 0 16 0 16.00 - (w 3)
Prashanth 2.0 0 29 0 14.50 - (w 1)
Anil 4.0 0 36 1 9.00 36.00
Kiran 3.0 0 21 0 7.00 -
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2nd Inning Batting: AMD, AMD
R B 4's 6's SR
Karthik b Venugopal 14 18 0 0 77.78
Viswajeet lbw b Vijay 2 8 0 0 25.0
Vikas c Vijay b Gunashekar 30 22 5 0 136.36
Prashanth c Prasad b Suman 21 19 2 0 110.53
Kiran st Syed b Vijay 34 23 4 0 147.83
Piyush c Suman b Venugopal 10 9 1 0 111.11
Harry st Syed b Vijay 0 1 0 0 0.0
Arun b Bhargav 1 4 0 0 25.0
Ravi not out 3 4 0 0 75.0
Anil b Chetan 1 2 0 0 50.0
Chetan lbw b Chetan 0 1 0 0 0.0
Extras(w 10, nb 1, b 5, lb 2) 18
Total (10 wickets; 18.2 overs) 134 7.31 RPO
Fall of Wicket: 5-1 ( Viswajeet 1.5 ov ), 54-2 ( Karthik 7.4 ov ), 55-3 ( Vikas 8.1 ov ), 110-4 ( Prashanth 14.1 ov ), 119-5 ( Kiran 15.2 ov ), 119-6 ( Harry 15.3 ov ), 128-7 ( Arun 16.6 ov ), 130-8 ( Piyush 17.1 ov ), 134-9 ( Anil 18.1 ov ), 134-10 ( Chetan 18.2 ov )
2nd Inning Bowling: MMavericks Cricket Club, MCC
O M R W EC AV EX
Chetan 3.2 0 25 2 7.50 12.50 (w 1, nb 1)
Vijay 4.0 0 20 3 5.00 6.67
Gunashekar 2.4 0 11 1 4.13 11.00 (w 1)
Venugopal 3.0 0 21 2 7.00 10.50 (w 5)
Ankit 2.0 0 13 0 6.50 - (w 1)
Sunil 2.0 0 27 0 13.50 - (w 1)
Suman 1.0 0 9 1 9.00 9.00
Bhargav 0.2 0 1 1 3.00 1.00
Post match ceremony
Full match report with individual performance details
You can download the pdf from here.
Performer of the Match: Gunashekar (MCC)
Gunashekar receiving his Performer of the Match trophy from match referee Jobin Varghese
Match Result: MCC defeated AMD by 45 runs
Points: MCC (2) AMD (0)
The CouchExpert 
Perfect start of the tournament and finishing it in a style:) congrats to MCC team. Venu
Great team effort!!