Elites B Clinched 1st Division Title

by Fouad Choudhary

After winning the T20 Championship Elites CC had the First Division title next in sight. Finishing at the top of the First Division(10-2) got them a bye to the finals and had them waiting for the result of Greenfield CC (9-3) vs Rising Stars B (8-4) semi-final game.

Led by some exceptional bowling by Alex Degling and Gurman Gill, Greenfield got RisingStars all out for 122 runs. Sunil Bandaru and Shekhar S. then helped chase the score with ease and stormed Greenfield into the finals with a convincing 7 wicket win.

Greenfield CC continued their bowling dominance in the finals and had Elites B CC struggling from the very start of the final game. Karl Stevensen bowled through the top order and had Elites B down at 47/4 after 10 overs. Ronak Mehta of Elites was then able to stabilize the Elites batting by first building a partnership of 28 with Fouad Choudhary and then a very valuable partnership of 58 with Anuj Ahuja. Gurman Gill and Rishi Bahadur of Greenfield CC then triggered a collapse which saw Elites CC go from 158\6 to a paltry final score of 163\all out.

Elites CC required nothing short of a perfect effort on the field to defend this small total and they got just that. Yasoob Haq provided the team with the early breakthrough by bowling out the in-form batsman Sunil Bandaru. Greenfield's captain, Rahul Singh then anchored the innings and formed a 78 run partnership with Rishi Bahadur. However, Elites spin trio of Nauman Naushahi, Farhan Pervez and Anuj Ahuja kept on the pressure and Elites fielding then did the rest of the damage. Brilliant catches by Anuj (2), Farhan, Fouad and Dawinder along with high quality wicket keeping by Dhrupad Shah (1 catch, 1 stump) kept the wickets falling regularly. Manik Dod of Greenfield played a good knock of 21* at the end but with only 7 runs to win in 2 overs Elites' fielding fittingly got them the last wicket (run out by Yasoob/Anuj) and won them the First Division championship.