March 20th, the day we REDISCOVERED the good cricketing skills in all d three departments – bowling, batting and fielding. Very few must have noticed that there were 3 batches of MSIT playing together.
The pretext to this match was an exhaustive CNK session at JNTU. We planned to play a match at JNTU after d session but could not due to d unavailability of the ground. Summer has started, but d day was cloudy. We returned to IIIT. We could not wait to get on d sporting shoes and tracks. Deepak, the most successful captain of MSIT!!, called up juniors. Both, juniors and also 2 seniors were on d ground in no time. Raghu was reluctant but Sandy n I did some gambling by exchanging some words and using the emotional atyachaar! trick on him and thus forced him to be there on the ground.
That’s it, no more drama, just pure action thereafter. It was a COMEBACK match for the injured player Pavan, and the ever busy Thadaka and Dayanand. Deepak n Sandy, the captains, divided d teams for a 10 over per side match. Deepak won d toss and elected to bat. Thadaka, who mesmerized everyone wid his excellent talk earlier in d day, showed some good bowling form during the practice and so we decided to give him d NEW ball. But he did not live upto the team’s expectation and gave away 11 runs and also injured a batsman, Surya. Next over was mine, did some pretty good job, just 6 runs of it.
The pitch was a true bouncing track and with a new ball it was very exciting. I just loved the pitch for what it offered to the bowlers. Thadaka, a stubborn by nature!, returned for d 3rd over and gave away 11 more runs again !!. 3 overs up and Deepak’s team was 28/0. I bowled the 4th over and the very first bowl Deepak hit a boundary of a bouncer, it was an awesome shot. But the next 5 balls I did not let him take a single run. It’s my personal best against d best batsman of MSIT, 5 dot balls against him, yuppie..!!. That’s it, Sandy’s team made a comeback and gave away just 20 runs in d last 7.5 overs, thanks to the economic bowling by him, Raghu n RamReddy. setting d target to 53.
Sandy’s team chased it down wid few hiccups. It was a storm that stopped Raghu and me hit the winning runs. All ran to hostel for shelter except Raghu, Deepak n I. We let ourselves get drenched by the rain in d ground. For a moment I thought it isn’t March but July or August. But then the thought of leaving the IIIT campus after two months made me realize that it is March indeed. This place has given me everything that I desired in my life – from sports to studies to friends to resources to freedom. It is upto individuals to make use of it. For me, I played my three best shots – the cover drive, the straight drive and the square cut(probably the only shots that I play!). Raghu, the only admirer of my off-side strokes, on the non-striker’s end must have enjoyed it to the fullest.
Coming back to this day’s never ending tale, we had an exhaustive photo session in the hostel wid d wet clothes on, and thank God Sairam wasn’t there! The pics speak more than what I can write, courtesy Prashant Budihal’s creativity and Deepak’s cam. Thereafter, I worked on the ISB project for thereafter. Last but not d least, we had an intense tennis practice under the aegis of Raghu and Vamshi after the dinner. We missed Sharma, who went home last night, but Sairam - the emerging player - filled the void. What more does one asks for in a single day? It had everything – studies, sports and good memories wid friends. In fact, I was raring to have a day like this as I couldn’t be a part of it in d recent past. I fear many of my batch mates or at least I will get into some sort of depression (not in its true sense) once we leave IIIT and if we do not keep ourselves busy wid something or d other then.
Finally, many of u must be wondering why I started off blogging wid this post. I already have some generalized blog topics in my mind, but sometimes life is all about what u enjoy the most and u just want to have a written script of it so that everyone involved cherish those moments later.
