Team Cheetah

Finally, more than 10 guys showed up for Cheetah's practice session this morning. As planned, first 10 - 15 mins of today's practice was devoted to formation of the team batting line up and bowlers for friendly games with other teams, including league teams.

There was consensus among team members for a need for the top order to keep the scoreboard ticking steadily in the starting overs. An overly defensive approach adopted during the last friendly game, backfired, with too much pressure on the batsmen who followed. Also without proper line up in place, players were sent to the middle by random card draw approach. Cheetah's have an interesting mix of players. Top order comprises of the following players:

• Selva Santhanam
• Praveen Mahure
• Arvind Raghu
• Mahesh (Mica)
• Ram Annasami
• Ram Suryanarayanan
• Parag Desai

All the above players can play steady innings, but not score more than run a ball. However, the need of the hour for Cheetahs is to have top order hold the wicket and not crumble exposing the middle order. Not all the players can show up for every single game. Hence having a pool of 5 to 6 players designated for the top provides the team with flexibility to position players according to the match situation. Game plan is to have the top order play for 7-8 overs (in a 20 over game) at about run a ball, mainly through singles and twos. After this period, top order has the license to go for bigger shots and score at a rapid rate without worrying about losing their wickets. Ideally, middle order should have a go at the bowlers from overs 14 - 20. Now speaking about middle order, the following players form the pool for middle order:

• Ben Thomas
• Guruji (Raja)
• Satish
• Nikhil (if he ever shows up again!)
• Sreejan (same as Naveen)
• Ranjith
• Manish Desai
• Nirav

This leaves the rest to come towards the end and have a free swing from the word 'GO'. These free birds towards the end of the innings are:

• Suresh
• Sreedhar
• Sudar

Bowling pool includes the following players:

• Ram Suryanarayanan
• Praveen
• Suresh
• Guruji
• Mica
• Selva
• Ram Annasami
• Ranjith
• Manish
• Nirav
• Parag
• Sreedhar

By the way, during the next practice, please take a moment to congratulate Sudar for taking up the wicket keeper duty for the team. Sudar would be thinking twice about taking this new role, with everyone expecting a Dujon or Kiran More out of him rather than a Kamran Akmal! With practice, I think Sudar would make a good keeper, as he can stop pretty much any ball either by catching or falling over it :)

Practice drills, for batting, bowling, fielding, and wicket keeping are required prior to the start of games every week. This can be done between 8.30 - 9.00 am. For those, who think they can perform at the expected levels, without practice, good luck! try to match those guys who gain better skills through practice.

A quick bulletin on today's game. During the first game, Basher Ben took the score to a daunting 62 of 10 overs against Arvi's team by scoring a few boundaries on either side of the wicket. Guruji's bowling was not up to the mark, as he had to bowl with sore shoulder picked up from his badminton game on Saturday. In response, Selva and Arvi started scoring steadily and kept the run rate around 4 for the first 4 overs. Once Arvi fell, slashing a wide delivery outside the off stump, Mica got in and made full use of the 1G rule behind the wicket and played some beautiful deliberate cuts through the slip area. Sudar was not able to dive to slip position every other ball, as expected by Ben and had to switch roles with Ben! Ben wanted to have someone trash talk behind the wickets too. Hope Sudar can get some trash talk coaching from Ben! On the bowling front, Suresh exhibited excellent control during the first game by compromising on the speed for better line and length. Praveens' tempting line with a looping delivery can deceive even the best in business. Ranjith tried a little hard to avoid short deliveries, however, a few short ones were promptly dispatched to the mid wicket fence by Selva and Guruji. With 23 to win of 18 deliveries, Guruji sensed victory. However, a brain fart (as crisply put by Mica), made Guruji run for a non-existing single resulting in a disastrous run out to hand victory to Ben's team.

In the second game, with notable contributions from Selva and Guruji, Arvi's team scored a good 38 runs from the alloted 6 overs. However, Ranjith's focused innings carried Ben's team across the finish line without much fuss during the last over of their innings. What went wrong with Arvi's team? May be poor bowling at death and a few crucial dropped catches. Although the scoreline read 2-0, the intensity of today's game was on par with any game in the TCA league. Ground fielding was at its best in both the games today. Hope to have full strength practice during the next few weeks and get ready for another friendly game with one of the bay area teams.

With this level of practice, Cheetah's can finally roar with pride instead of a meek meow!

PS: Feel free to post team strategy and line up opinions in the comments section. Also, in case I have missed any of our players, please mention their names as well. I can add their names to the post. Can't afford to miss any of you!