Doctors Open Season With Easy Win
- Shamsul Kazi
- Oct 17, 2016
- 3 min read
SMXI 8/123(20) Def By PDCC 4/124(18)
A. Panju 63* Morgan 2/6(2.0) Barker 2/24(4.0)
Wowee! What a start to the season!
With an extended build up to the first game of the new season that saw major changes in the structures off the field, it was finally time to step back on to it. This time against the Scott Mueller’s XI at Kianawah Park Ground 11.
Rob Corrigan took captaincy duties again, but for the first time since being appointed as vice-captain, Andrew Summers was able to take the field as the deputy. After 6 months on the sideline with a knee injury, the keeper-batsmen was ready to make his comeback. Alongside the two, team veterans Shamsul Kazi, Nathan Morgan, Raja Chinthamuneedi, Abbas Panju and Jo Corrigan returned to the squad. Making up the rest of the team were winter season recruits, Rishi Gupta, Tony Pham, Jordan Barker, Hassaan Shahid and Kanishka Chaudhary.
In a strange turn of events Corrigan won the toss and was so stunned that he had not planned on having to decide what to do. With the aid of his deputy he made the decision to send the opposition in to bat.
The opening bowling combination of R Corrigan and S Kazi was a mixed bag with the latter going for 19 off his first two overs after being hit for consecutive maximums down the ground by Reed, though there were a couple of run out opportunities beforehand. Corrigan was a little better but went for 14 off his first two overs.
A change in bowling sparked a surge by the Doctors with Carr being run out from a direct hit from Kazi after hitting it directly straight to the fielder at short mid-wicket. A result of the bowling of Shahid who had been strangling the batsmen with tight bowling.
Tony Pham was brought in to replace Corrigan at the other end and he made the synthetic pitch look like a drop in from Chennai as he made the bowl stalk with variable bounce and swing. He was soon rewarded with the wicket of Crook with a hooping in-swinger to take out his stumps. Pham was to finish with figures of 1/20 from his four overs.
Down the other end Shahid continued to apply the screws with tight bowling and snared the key wicket of Reed for 29 when he bunted one down to R Corrigan at mid-off. Shahid ended with 1/11 off his three overs.
After the fall of Reed the batting order quickly crumbled as tight middle over bowling from Barker and Morgan bowling in a great partnership that saw them get two wickets a piece and saw the Mueller’s XI lose their last 5 wickets for a measly 24 runs.
The penultimate over saw comical scenes as Kazi was brought on to bowl an over of Off spin, rushing between balls to ensure that the Doctors were not penalised for a slow over rate. Before Barker finished off the innings with a tight last over that went for four runs. The Doctors restricting the Mueller’s XI to a measly 8/123 from their 20 overs.
The batting effort by the Doctors started strong with Chinthamuneedi and Panju maintaining a strong seven-an-over run rate in the first two overs before Chinthamuneedi had his stumps taken out. Panju powered on with Chaudhary as the two sought to solidify the innings before Chaudhary’s innings was cut short by a stunning one handed catch by the keeper moving to his right.
Panju proved to be the cornerstone of the innings as old opening partner Jo Corrigan aided him by rotating the strike to allow the small Pakistani to blast the bowlers to all corners of the park.
Panju was to bring up his 50 with only 20 runs needed and everything was going to plan before Corrigan didn’t quite get a hold of one and was caught on the longer pavilion end boundary.
This brought Gupta to the crease. Though his tenure was short, skying the ball to gully, he edged the team closer to a victory. Gupta’s dismissal brought the deputy to the crease. After a six-month wait, he was finally able to bring in the sponsorship money with his brand new bat. The sponsors would have been happy when the man they call Hoover got sucked into a ball on a good length outside off and dispatched it over cover for a boundary on his first ball back. After a few hiccups trying to chase down the last run, the big man got down low to glance one to fine leg to seal the victory with Panju remaining not out on 62.
Doctors win by 6 wickets.