Inter Divisional final 2019
It has been two years since we played inter divisional cricket tournament on Tata Motors Cricket ground as the ground closed for renovation work. After renovation, the ground has been better than before and in its best condition for playing cricket. After seeing, a ground that has been reborn and rejuvenated every cricketer of Tata Motors was very excited to go and play on this beautiful ground having lush green outfield with layers of green grass. I feel very proud to say that BCCI has asked for this ground for their national level matches.
The tournament that we play every year called the world cup of Tata Motors. It is very famous among cricketers. If you performed well in this tournament then you can get an opportunity to play for Tata Motors Ltd in industrial and inter-Tata cricket tournaments. This year total 14 teams participated from various departments and few of them were going to participate for the first time. A lot of changes have been made to this tournament since this year. Earlier we used to play in white clothes and with red ball and now we were going to play in coloured clothes with white ball. This was the biggest attraction of this year's inter divisional cricket tournament.
Car Plant A and Common Services (TTL) teams played their best cricket and outclassed their each opponent in every aspect of the game and reached the finals. Common services defeated PE (Production Engineering) and Car plant defeated ERC (Engineering Research Centre) in their respective semi-finals. Surprisingly, powerful team like auto division could not make any impact this year.
The final match was played between Car Plant A and Common Services (TTL) on 17th Dec 2019 at 12:30 pm. There was little fog in the morning and winter is causing lot of dew on the field in the morning. By the noon, the dew had dried up well. There were some dark clouds in the sky and common services captain elected to bat first. After winning the toss, any other captain would have done the same. History says that those who have batted first won the most of the matches in inter divisional finals. Moreover, an expert always says chasing is always difficult in pressure match like finals.
Car Plant opening bowler Kailas Dange gave an excellent start by taking the wicket of left-handed opening batsman in very first over. He cleaned him up by excellent in swinger. Snehal Mane was doing equally good job from the other end. Both were bowling accurate line and length and well supported by equally good fielding. After 5 overs score was 21 for 1. It was such a time of the match when any team could have taken the advantage. The batsmen were most likely to dominate the remaining part of their inning as their 9 wkts were intact. Myself Vijay Vasve came to bowl in 6th over of the match. Playing as an all rounder, I have to do bowling as well. In semi-finals, I shared new ball with Kailas Dange but in finals captain had different plans. I came to bowl as a first change from athletic ground end.
Left handed batsman on strike and I started running to bowl my first delivery in the final match. The first ball bowled by me was the perfect execution of my natural swing. It took banana shape while travelling in the air, pitched outside off stump, short of length and went furiously towards off stump. I was surprised to see that ball went over the off stump by 2-3 inches. I was in disbelief. I could not understand whether it was a bounce in the pitch or strength of my shoulder. I realised that luck factor was not going to help me today. This belief grew further when I tried to catch a rapid stroke from batsman in my follow throw but that ball hit my left hand and went to the boundary line fielder. That was an unsuccessful attempt.
Before travelling to boundary line, the seam of the ball hit my left thumb and it hit so hard that left thumb started bleeding heavily. Drops of red blood started appearing on the green grass of the cricket field. Everyone rushed to my left thumb and first aid kit brought in action for the first time in this tournament. That wound cleaned completely with antiseptic liquid and wrapped in bandage with cotton pads. Batsman apologised sportingly though he didn't hit that intentionally and I said, "It's OK don't worry, it's not your fault".
I made sure that my thumb is not fractured and only then I started bowling remaining balls of my over. I bowled the last ball like I did the first one. This time batsman cramped for the room and gave an outside edge to wicket keeper while attempting square cut. I removed well set batsman despite having injury in left thumb. whole team erupted in joy. Wicket keeper Sandip Aher praised a lot that tactics used by me. After 6 overs score was 25/2. Pressure was mounting on batsman to score quick runs. They were trying their best. Ganesh bowled his 1st and team's 7th over without considering a boundary. Score was 7 overs 31/2.
In 8th over after considering a boundary I caught their main batsman Mahesh More in front of the wickets. This wicket was like a small step towards victory. Whole team erupted in joy once again. We took the full control of the game from there. After 8 overs score was only 37/3. Common services team never recovered from that situation. They kept loosing wickets and in the end score was merely 83/10. Ganesh Gawali took 3 wkts and gave only 15 runs in his 4 overs. Kailas Dange 1/9 (4 overs), Snehal Mane 1/19 (4 overs), Captain Pravin Kamble 1/16 (4 overs) and myself Vijay Vasve took 2 main wkts by considering 20 runs in 4 overs.
After having short target of 84 runs Car Plant batsmen finished the match in style and in only 12th over. Dinesh Kadbane 20, Suresh Bhosale 24* and Pankaj Wackchoure 31* scored heavily and proved that that wicket was good for batting also. Pankaj scored one huge six over mid wicket. Car Plant team comprehensively won by 9 wkts. Victory was celebrated as per our tradition in Saptrishi hotel.
Since Car plant team started participating in inter-divisional cricket tournament this was 12th time that we won the championship. We were runners-up for 4 times and 3 times we did not make it to the finals.
In 8th over after considering a boundary I caught their main batsman Mahesh More in front of the wickets. This wicket was like a small step towards victory. Whole team erupted in joy once again. We took the full control of the game from there. After 8 overs score was only 37/3. Common services team never recovered from that situation. They kept loosing wickets and in the end score was merely 83/10. Ganesh Gawali took 3 wkts and gave only 15 runs in his 4 overs. Kailas Dange 1/9 (4 overs), Snehal Mane 1/19 (4 overs), Captain Pravin Kamble 1/16 (4 overs) and myself Vijay Vasve took 2 main wkts by considering 20 runs in 4 overs.
After having short target of 84 runs Car Plant batsmen finished the match in style and in only 12th over. Dinesh Kadbane 20, Suresh Bhosale 24* and Pankaj Wackchoure 31* scored heavily and proved that that wicket was good for batting also. Pankaj scored one huge six over mid wicket. Car Plant team comprehensively won by 9 wkts. Victory was celebrated as per our tradition in Saptrishi hotel.
Since Car plant team started participating in inter-divisional cricket tournament this was 12th time that we won the championship. We were runners-up for 4 times and 3 times we did not make it to the finals.
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