Scorecard TITANS vs Spiders

Result: TITANS lost by 23 runs

Our objective coming into this match was to seal our position in the second round and at the same point of time continue the winning streak which would directly seal our quarter final birth. Weather was ideal Spiders won the toss and had no hesitation to bat first. Coming into this game we all knew that Spiders was a good batting side and that precise bowling and sharp fielding would be needed to restrict them.
(We lost the sixth consecutive toss in DCL' 04.Looks like Ganguly has a secret admirer in Kapil)

Spiders batting
We had identified their hitters and were to be signaled by our scorer when any one of them would come to bat. The plan was to keep it simple and stick to the off side line.
Satheesh started the bowling with Abhilash. Satheesh started with a lot of pace but from the first over he was struggling to get any sort of rhythm on the middle and off stump line. Abhilash started off well with a half chance at square leg but bounced back with a beauty of a delivery and rearranged the woodwork of the Spiders captain. Three balls later he induced an edge of their one down batsman which was not picked by the umpire. In the same over he produced an other beauty and Spiders were 12/2. Satheesh bowled a couple of good deliveries in his 3rd over and then spilt a straight forward chance. The bowling from there started to be wayward and Kapil was forced to remove Satheesh of the attack and replace him with Abhay. Spiders rode their luck thru half chances and started milking the bowling and were also aided by some wayward bowling. Fielding was sharp in patches, From 12/2 Spiders went into cruise control and were at 49/2 during the break. After the break titans recharged their batteries and Vijay started his first spell but it was not until the 15th over(Amit's second over) that the break could be induced thanks to an outstanding single handed outfield catch by Abhay. Titans were back in the ball game, Vinay and Amit bowled some good overs to tie down the Spiders batting and it was yet another superb catch in the deep by Abhay that gave Amit his second wicket and saw the back of another Spiders batsman. Suddenly bowling came alive but still the fielding was nothing close to the standards we have set in our earlier games. Vijay ,Vinay and Amit bowled the end overs with great control and Spiders lost regular wickets towards the end and what was turning out to be a mammoth total during the break was drastically reduced and Spiders crawled their way to 96/9 at the end from 82/6 in 20 overs. The last 5 overs produced 14 runs.

Titans batting
Titans opened the batting with Shilpan and Kapil. It looked like a dream start and an ideal start as we were chasing the highest score so far in the league from our team's standpoint. Spiders bowling was erratic and lacked venom. Kapil and Shilpan were taking sharp singles and also helped by some nonsense bowling by the opposition. It was 23/0 in the 5th over when Kapil did not pick Shilapn's call and there was terrible mix up and Shilpan was back in the pavilion . Srinivas came in and there was an appeal for caught behind on the very first ball but the umpire did not bother and he survived and stood his ground even though the opposition threw a fit at the call. In the next over Kapil was bowled to a ball that kept low. In came Abhilash and for a very brief period it looked like the consolidation effort had begun and Titans were 41/2 at the end of 10 overs. In the 11th over of the game Abhilash was trapped plumb to a ball that kept low. Abhay came in and at break Titans were 46/2. The asking rate was not very high but the need of the hour was to keep wickets and milk the bowling. The end of the 14th over saw the back of Lakshman and then a rush of blood saw Sandeep in the stands too. From there on it the batting crumbled and what looked like a comfortable target at one stage turned out to be a Herculean effort in the end.It was again Abhay who had the onus to deliver on his shoulders and in an effort to step up the gas and shield the tail enders threw his wicket to a good outfield catch. Fall of Abhay's wicket and with the asking rate climbing it was always a matter of time the end was inevitable.The last 5 overs need 36 runs but with the failure of the top order the script for the chase was already written.


Embarassing moment of the match : Two of the Spider's players created chaos in the game, fighting for every decision Umpire gave against them and charged towards the batsman. It also resulted in some of the TITANS losing their temper and the sportsmanship was lost.