PSYG Alamdar XI - Game 2                                                                                                                                       IMAGES

Game Report                                                                                                                     

In cricket, sometimes things just fall into place for some teams, sometimes it is just pure luck, sometimes certain situations assists a team to victory. BUT the game of PSYG Alamdar XI against Tigers on the 8th December was an outstanding display of one of the most amazing teamwork rarely seen even on the professional international level of cricket.

What a game it was after the first game, it was clear that Alamdar XI needed to focus on fielding and bowling. And on the second game, fielding and bowling had improved 200% without any practice or training, proving that we always had it in us. One of the most impressive points to note in the entire game was that each player was relaxed and was having fun, from the team discussion before the game were we heard more jokes then serious strategies, at half time when we were busy munching on the chips and coke and during the game encouraging each other, the team had fun.

Yet again, the toss was won by Alamdar XI Captain Raza Hussain and he choose to bat. Alamdar XI team was the same except for three replacements of Ali Syed, Ali Kazmi & Haider Shah by Akbar Shah, Asad Zafar and little star Ali Gulani. Tigers were missing two players in the beginning and the places where temporally filled by Ali Faiyaz uncle and Shabir Alidina uncle, however the players arrived within the first two over.

Batting:

The question on who should be the opening batsman did not even required a second thought from Captain Raza Hussain sending Asghar Shah and Khurram Mehdi, who proved to be a successful opening batsmen in the first game. And yet again, they were exceptional. They skillfully played the first over settling in the game, and then firing it up in the second over with each of them scoring a boundary and taking the score to 21 runs by the end of second over. Their batting was marvelous, as both yet again created a partnership of 50 runs. Asghar's aggression and Khurram's placement through the gaps took the team through the six overs, with the run rate of 13 an over.

However, an unfortunate outside edge of Wasi's ball caught behind by Salman got Asghar out, with a total of 22 runs a display of beautiful cricket.

The next batsman from Alamdar XI was Akbar Shah, supporting Khurram who was unstoppable. Akbar's wonderful shots, promising relaxed play, plus some great running between the wickets kept the runs ticking. They tried to initiate a great partnership, which ended as Akbar was caught behind the wicket of Mohsin's ball. Then came Asad Zafar to the crease, and played a great shot which due to the high winds and light weight of a taped ball, left the ball in the air for too long and was caught, bring the Captain Raza H on crease. He played a nice shot on the leg side but an unexpected hard & perfect throw ended captain’s inning with a run out.

Tigers thought that the pressure would now be on the batting side with the quick fall of 4 wickets in 2 over, but they forgot that the danger man Khurram was still on crease and quick runner Jaffar Mehdi was heading towards the crease for another display of fine cricket. Both brothers had a quick discussion and fired things up showing the Tigers that the game was not over yet. As Jaffar settled in and providing full support on the other side of the wicket, Khurram stepped up the game and started scoring boundaries and double runs, in fact 8 out of the last 10 balls that Khurram played were either 4 or 2 runs, taking him close to his first half century, but tragically he was run out on 49; he set the team with a great score and displayed beautiful and intelligent cricket, just an awesome work.

Next batsman was Raza Gulani. With the fall of Khurrams wicket, Jaffar knew he had to turn aggressive on the crease and the very next ball he scored a boundary sending a message to the opponents that we are not yet ready to give up. Followed by a spectacular 3 runs for Jaffar with great support of Raza Gulani on the other side. Raza G also displayed some great cricket with his first shot over the bowlers head for 2 runs. Jaffar And Raza G together showed some outstanding running between the wicket and kept the runs rising and both were set for a great partnership, but the 16 overs were up. Both Jaffar on 19 runs and Raza G on yet again 5, both were not-out. The final score was 5/139, a decent score but the entire team knew that the final result of the game depends on Alamdar XI's fielding and bowling.

Bowling:

A short break was taken before the Alamdar XI headed back on the field. Captain Raza H got busy setting up the field, Captain Raza H carefully positioned the players on the field; the field was set to mainly stop boundaries. Bowling spell was initiated by Captain Raza H who knew that an early wickets were essential to give Alamdar XI a fighting chance to victory. And guess what… he took the first wicket in the first over, a beautiful ball which the batsman tried to play on the leg side, instead got an outside edge and was wonderfully caught behind the wicket by Khurram. The entire team came running to the pitch to celebrate this outstanding achievement.

This was just the start of a superb bowling from Raza H and Asad Zafar, bowling at perfect line and length. The batting side seem to play most of their game on the leg side, where Raza G was placed for fielding who not only stopped the boundaries but tried to get on the ball as quickly as possible to insure only one run. The frustrated batting side then tried to play on all sides of the ground but all the fieldsmen like Imran, Akbar, Jaffar were not only stopping the boundaries but stopped the doubles. Soon a perfect bowl by Captain Raza H straight on the wicket got the Tigers captain Masroor bowled for 13 runs. Very next over Asad Zafar bowled a loose ball to encourage the batsman to play and to be caught, which is exactly what happened, the batsmen tried to hit a six but the ball was wonderfully caught near the boundary by Akbar Shah.

The pressure was quickly rising on the batting side, after the wonderful bowling of Raza H 2/18 and Asad Zafar 1/30, they clearly broke through the top batting order of Tigers. Then came Khurram and Akbar to bowling, Khurram's bowling was outstanding as he took out Wasi who seemed to be settling in the game caught by Raza H. The pressure was increasing further on the other side just like a pressure cooker and Tigers captain Masroor was getting frustrated. But Alamdar XI just wanted to go home early, and did not wanted to let Tigers get 100 runs. On the other side Akbar took the next wicket with an amazing bowling; batsmen bowled for only 3 runs. The bottom order was taken out by Akbar and Khurram and were very well backed up by the fielding side particularly by Ali Gulani on the off side, his fielding was just outstanding. His perfect, on the target throws got two run outs and he took a superb catch. Followed by remarkable 2 wickets from Khurram straight on the wicket bowled the lower batting order ending the game. All players were out for only 97 runs.

The performance of Alamadar XI in this match proved the youth capabilities, teamwork and dedication to achieve the set target. The game was won purely, with hard work, great fielding and backing up each other, spot-on bowling and superb batting. Alamdar XI aced every aspect of the game as a team and got the victory.

Our next game is on the Saturday 15th December against Bombers Captain Ali Faiyaz. They have won both the last two game against Tigers and Lions, but with the similar performance Alamdar XI Inshallah will win the next game too.

Written by: Raza Gulani

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