The CamKerala season started belatedly on 17/7/2011 with a lost thriller against Girton. On a rainy day with frequent interruptions for showers, Girton scored the winning runs with two wickets and one over to spare. In a low scoring game CamKerala overcame its bad start to put up a great fight and the result on another day may have been easily different.
Vijai won the toss, a shock from which CamKerala’s initial batsmen did not recover. Raaj and Austin opened the innings in a semi attacking gambit. Raaj was the first to go given out caught behind of the second ball of the innings. An optical illusion tricked the umpire (this writer) into believing that the ball went off the bat edge and not the pads as Raaj the victim opined. In walked Vinod ever ready to guide the ball to the nether regions on the offside. At the other end Austin got out without troubling the scorers. Vinod in the interim guided a couple of deliveries to the boundary and then was caught in the act by an alert second slip. Thus in the third over CamKerala were 15-3 and captain Vijai was called upon to produce the rescue act in partnership with this writer. The partnership went on to the 17th over when this writer’s legside flick did not trouble the fielder positioned next to the square leg umpire. At 57-4 the moment was ripe for some Kapil Devesque hitting, however last night Samson who gave the impression of preparing for a big hit ended up skying the ball to cover for a golden duck. Thomas managed 4, Jerin 8 and a rain interruption ended Vijai’s vigil after a well compiled 36. There was some tail end heroics between Jobi (14) and Saji and the latter scored a quickfire 22 which gave CamKerala a fighting total of 129 runs to defend.
When Girton started the chase CamKerala needed quick wickets and early breakthroughs were provided by Jobi and Samson. Girton consolidated for the next 10 overs until Vinod captured the first of his 4 wickets at the score of 62. Two more wickets fell quickly, one of them to Austin, and in the 16th over Girton were 63-5. At this point CamKerala appeared to have the better of the exchanges. Girton had their two big hitters at the wicket and Om was brought on in the 19th over to buy a wicket. Om almost managed it when he lured and beat the big hitter with flight and turn but Saji was unable to carryout a stumping that would have done Kirmani proud. The match turned at this point as Om was hit for four boundaries in the over. Vijai was forced to return to medium pace to ration the runs and Thomas managed to snare a batsman. However runs leaked in singles and twos and Girton were relieved to reach the winning total in the 29th over.
The highlight of the game was the excellent catching by Saji behind the stumps. Vinod’s tally of 4 wickets ensured that no other team member would go to a pub with him. And Thomas like all bowlers expects higher fielding standards when he is bowling. Om got a demonstration of it when his misfield made Thomas shout out the commonly used term for procreation which rhymes with muck.
It was a hard fought game and a good start to the season by CamKerala at a time when other teams seem to be coming to the end of their season.