Summer (and cricket) is here!

After what was quite a comfortable win the previous week, we were full of confidence as we travelled to Sussex. The opposition won the toss and elected to bat first on a wicket that offered plenty of assistance to the seamers early on. The Sussex captains decision to bat first was seeming like the wrong one when Simon Mitchell had one of their openers caught behind in the second over, more tight bowling from Simon and our captain Jayanth Ganapathy saw the pressure mount on the Sussex batsman and Jayanth took advantage of this, flattening the Sussex number 3’s off stump in emphatic style. Some wayward bowling from first change bowler Jack McCurley relieved the opposition of the pressure that was applied by the opening bowlers. As soon as spin was introduced it seemed as though the pressure was back on the opposition as left-arm spinner Darshan Patel bowled his first two overs for just one run and controversially bowled their other opener. Sadly this was as good as it got for Patel as he continually conceded extras throughout his spell and although he ended with figures of seven overs 1-23, 14 of those runs were gifted to the batting side in sundries. From the other end, Vignesh Venkateswaran was unplayable (10-4-17-2) and if it wasn’t for a few edges his 10 overs would have gone for even less than they did. Despite this and some tidy bowling at the death by Jayanth (10-3-21-2) and Simon (9-1-30-1), extras flowed freely throughout the innings as well as seven dropped catches and Sussex closed their innings on 183-6, which was really 50 more than they should’ve gotten.

In reply, Anmol Bedi and Y. Varma got us off to a good start and it seemed as though we would reach the target with overs to spare. In the fifth over out of nowhere the pitch started to do things that we didn’t see at all in the previous innings. Some very penetrative bowling and excellent fielding saw Sussex take wickets at regular intervals. Joe O’Gorman offered some resistance against their strong bowling attack and top scored with 18, this was unfortunately not enough and we were 64 all out in 25 overs. A disappointing performance; in a game that on another day, we could have won quite comfortably; led to a 119 run loss with the difference between the two sides being solely down to a lack of discipline on our part bowling 33 extras and dropping seven catches. Everyone agrees that there is much to be improved upon before the next game and I hope to bring you better news in the future. Watch this space!

- Darshan Patel

1st XI chase well

On Wednesday the 24th April, the BUCS Outdoor Cricket season began. We had our first game at our home ground Harlington against the University of Reading. Reading arrived late so the game was reduced to 46 overs per innings. Reading won the toss and chose to bat first.

Jayanth Ganapathy and Shazad Ahmad opened up and kept it tight at the start. We got a breakthrough early on and we were on top. Their next partnership was a good one and it seemed like we were going to chase a large total if we did not get a breakthrough. Shazil Choukath, our 1st change medium pacer, was brought into the attack and caused a few problems initially with his pace but soon enough, the batsmen started enjoying the extra pace on a slow pitch. The spinners, Darshan Patel and Joe O’Gorman, were brought in and immediately troubled both the set batsmen. It only took a few overs for the spinners to strike dismissing the pair.

More wickets fell and with the help of some tight bowling at the end of the innings we restricted Reading to 173-9 off 46 overs. Jayanth finished with excellent figures of 4 for 22 off 10 overs, Darshan with 2 for 20 off 9 overs, Shazad with 1 for 24 off 9 overs and Joe 2 for 36 off 9 overs. Imperial went in to bat after Tea needing 174 from 46 at around 3.8 runs per over.

Anmol Bedi and Vishal Nair opened up and were tested by Reading’s opening bowlers. Anmol was dismissed early and I, Juhin Patel, went in. Vishal and I played ourselves in and soon started opening up. We shared a strong 100 run partnership at a healthy run rate. However, in the same over I was run out for 37, Vishal was stumped on 57. Another wicket fell in that over and a collapse was possible. In came two new batsmen, Jayanth and Joe. They both played sensibly and kept the scoreboard ticking by working the ball around. Eventually, we successfully chased down the target with 10 overs left to play. Jayanth finished on 43 not out and Joe on 24 not out. It was a strong performance overall and we are now confident going into the next game.

- Juhin Patel

2nd XI cruise to 50 run win

IC 2nd XI’s second game of the season, and their first in BUCS, was against Kings Medics 1st XI, a team who had won their 2 games this season. However, a strong display by IC led to a comfortable 50-run victory.

Stand-in skipper Will Baker got off to a good start by assembling everyone at Putney Bridge station on time, before making the journey to Berrylands. With some glorious sunshine, and a flat pitch, IC made a strong start batting first. Chris Gayle Lomas Persadcracked a few unstoppable cover drives in typical Carribean fashion before being adjudged lbw on 28. Fellow opener Rohin Patel had a careful start before blazing his way to a match-winning 114. After successive boundaries, one of the opposition fielders remarked, “You can’t do anything about that, it’s just good batting.” He was in a hurry to get to somewhere after the game, and hopefully he got there. There was also good support from the middle order, with Hemant Morjaria’s 11 of 44 balls applauded by the skipper and dubbed as “the Samaraweera to Rohin’s Sangakkara”. Good contributions from Jai Patel, Will Baker, Johan Rekers, Cameron Currin and Umar Minhas led to an imposing total of 286.

With morale high, IC set about trying to get quick wickets, however the opening pair started well with a 130-run partnership. After Will Baker slipped and bowled a delivery over 2nd Slip’s head, the game was slipping away. However Lomas, who had bowled well without much luck, finally knocked leg stump over. With a tight 10-over spell from debutant Priyank Shah with 2 wickets and run out, IC were right back in the game. One of the more comical catches happened when Shah dropped an absolute dolly of his own bowling, but the ball popped straight into Cameron Currin’s hands at short extra cover. With electric fielding and tight bowling by Chris Hong from one end, spinner Vignesh Venkataraman had the opposition all-at-sea with a brilliant spell of 5 overs, conceding 8 runs and picking up 4 wickets, with some brilliant keeping from Jai Patel. Further wickets from Umar Minhas and Johan Rekers completed the innings. The opposition were visibly shaken, writing ‘Yosn’ instead of ‘Johan’ in the scorebook. The umpires were also baffled about some strange noises being heard on the field. This had no relation to where Hemant Morjaria was fielding, obviously.

Two catches from the skipper were enough to seal the victory in the rapidly fading light giving IC a handsome victory and maintaining their now 2 match unbeaten run!

- Priyank Shah