T

he Division 1 TATA Motors JCA League games this Sunday saw current cup holder KLN WISCI score its second consecutive victory, while in Division 2, Indorama CC and the Metro Indians registered comfortable wins.

At GMIS grounds, KLN WISCI took on Menara CC. Batting first; WISCI was given the perfect start by Viraj Bhammar and Surendran Chandramohan, who scored 62 and 66 runs, respectively, setting the platform for a big score.

Following the century partnership for the opening wicket, number 3 batsman Rajeev Rajeswaran then made a quick-fire 64 runs before Suhail Modak completed the innings with a blistering knock of 40 runs, which came off just 20 balls, setting a target of 304 runs. Harish Tiwary and Rahul Kukreja took two wickets each.

With a mammoth score to overhaul, Menara CC was under pressure to keep up with the required run rate, which saw them lose wickets at regular intervals, before eventually folding up for 176 runs in the 28th over.

Harish Tiwari top scored for Menara with 40 runs, while Deepak Khullar scored 27 runs. Tim Watson was the pick of the bowlers with two wickets, conceding just three runs, while Gaurav Tiwari, Deepak Singh and Surendra also chipped in with two wickets each, giving WISCI its victory by a margin of 127 runs.

In a Division 2 encounter at Cibubur, 118 runs for the third wicket between Vishvanath Kaushik ( 75 runs ) and Govind Sodani ( 43 runs ) helped Indorama CC defeat Ceylon CC by eight wickets.

Batting first, Ceylon CC slumped to 73/4 after 12 overs. Then a fine fighting partnership for the fifth wicket between Anand Srinivasan (83 runs) and captain Sabry Salahudeen (25 runs) seemed to give the score some respectability, before a fine bowling performance by Sethi PadmaCharan (5/48) saw Ceylon lose its last six wickets for just 46 runs to be all out for 202 runs. Arjun Chauhan chipped in with 2/45. Indorama then made short work of the target by overhauling it in the 30th over.

In another fixture between the Metro Indians and Chairos Tigers at Purwakarta, Metro defeated the Chairos Tigers by 63 runs.

Led by a fine opening wicket partnership of 183 runs off just 18 overs, Metro Indians piled up an above par score of 291 runs before being all out in the final over. The batting was lead by a fine century by opener Kirubashankar (106 runs) supported by Sakthi Narayanan (87 runs).

Representing the depth of the Indonesian talent, Chairos tigers made a spirited effort in going after the target, eventually finishing at 228/8. Nando top scored with 65 runs while Agi Septyasa remained not out on 55 runs. For Metro, John Antony took 4/37 runs while Sabu Joy took 2/34.

In an earlier game in Division 2, the Jaguars defeated Challengers CC (CSK) by 100 runs. Batting first, the Jaguars, lead by Dhimanshu Raghuwanshi (75 runs), motored along to 206/5 in 24 overs, which set the stage for big hitting batsman Sridhar Sasikumar to take charge. Wading into the CSK attack, Sasi then bludgeoned the bowling, scoring an unbeaten 142 runs off just 59 balls (13 Sixes and 11 boundaries), which helped Jaguar post a massive 335/7 in 35 overs. Ranjan Shankar and Santosh Kumar took two wickets each.

While chasing, despite a quick-fire half century (55 runs) by Dhanashekaran Ramalingam, and Jagan (35 runs) it was never going to be easy to overhaul the mammoth score, as Challengers fell short by 100 runs, to be all-out for 235 runs. For the Jaguars, Jagdeep Singh took 3/60, while, promising young Indonesian cricketer Muhammad Ridho took 2/24.