Twenty20 Cricket

Palash, Jintu sparkle in Bud Cricket:

Guwahati, Dec 20: The first Bud Challenge Twenty20 Cricket tournament for Dhireswar Kalita Cup saw two unique performances on Thursday.

Palashjyoti Das of Gauhati Town Club scored a magnificent 164 while Jintu Das of River Rine Club completed a hat-trick against Bud B in the other match of the day.

The first match of the day was between GCCC 'A' and Ankurjyoti Cricket Academy. Palash, who scored a magnificent century against Tripura in the last Ranji Plate match in the same ground, continued his fine form scoring 164 runs. He needed just 64 balls to score the runs with 18 boundaries.

The innings helped Palashjyoti Das to write a few record in his name. In the Twenty20 format of cricket, his 164 runs could be the highest one in city cricket while the batsman could become the first player of the city to hit 11 boundaries in an innings in the shorter version of the game.

Riding on his magnificent knock and a spirited 85 by Bikash Sharma, GCCC ‘A' scored 280 runs losing three wickets in 20 overs. Ankurjyoti Cricket Academy was bowled out for 88 runs. Bitap Mahanta bagged three wickets for 19 runs while Sidharth Oja scored 39 runs.

In the second match of the day, Jintu Das hogged the lime light, completing the first hat-trick of the tournament. The match saw the comeback of former Ranji cricketer Rajesh Bora in competitive cricket but this was over shadowed by Jintu who scalped four wicket for 26 runs.

Bating first Bud ‘B' was bowled out for 63 runs. Tilak Das and Rajdeep Ojha scored 14 and 13 runs respectively, while Rajesh Bora contributed 11 runs on the board. River Rine reached the target losing just a single wicket. Jintu Das (21) was the top scorer of the side.

Brief Scores:
GCCC 274/3 (Palashjyoti Das 164, Bikash Sharma 25); Ankurjyoti CA 88/4 (Sidharth Oja 39, Somnath Bhattacharyya 25, Bitop Mahanta 3/19).
Bud B 63 (Tilak Das 14, Jintu Das 4/26). River Rine 64/1 (Jintu Das 21, Laxman Das 17, Kaushik Oja 17).

Posted On: The Sentinel

Another Story:

New Dawn for Assam Cricketers

ACA to introduce ratings like Men in Blue:

Guwahati, Dec. 17: Assam cricketers will soon be rated on the lines of the Team India players.

The apex sports body in the state hopes that the ratings will help the players by giving them more mileage in the national scene and also ease the selection of probables and teams for the state from the next season onwards.

The Assam Cricket Association officials have already discussed the proposition with a Bangalore-based private firm 5K.

The director of 5K, Rajesh Khurana, has offered to rate players in different age groups from under-15 to Ranji level on the basis of their performance in domestic as well as international levels.

The ratings will shield the players from falling victim to the ACA’s so-called “political favouritism” towards players from certain districts and the practice of “depriving” better players from some other districts.

ACA secretary Bikash Baruah said, “The ratings should help us. No player will now be able to rake up a controversy after not getting a berth in the state team as their ratings will speak for them now”.

Besides easing the pressure on players and helping players judge their own performance, the ACA hopes that the ratings will further help the players get individual sponsorship from the corporate sector.

Although India Cements has chipped in as a team sponsor for the Ranji team this year, none of the first class players have any individual sponsor for their off-season coaching and personal upkeep.

The ACA was completely bowled over by the offer made by the Bangalore firm, as it would also help the apex body sign players on contract for the under-19 and Ranji teams.

Though Khurana could not be contacted for details, sources in his office said the process has been initiated after the “ACA showed keen interest in it”.

The monetary terms offered by 5K are yet to be worked out.

The firm has been rating the Karnataka players since last year.

Though the ACA has resolved to introduce graded contracts on the lines of the national team players, for the under-19 and Ranji players from the current season onwards, the Ranji season ended without completion of even the gradation of players.

The ACA has attributed the preoccupation of BCCI statistician Tapash Roy with his hectic schedule as the reason for the delay in gradation of state cricketers this season. Roy has been asked to provide the statistics of every player to the ACA.

“If 5K does the statistician’s job for us, we will be able to execute the contract system at the earliest,” said an ACA office bearer who attended the preliminary discussion with the Bangalore firm here yesterday.

Some of the state-level players have welcomed the development, saying that they hope the new plan will not turn out to be “another ploy” to delay their proposed contracts.

Posted On: The Telegraph

Ranji Plate Group A Match

Mammoth task ahead for Assam against Tripura:

Guwahati, Dec. 10: A career best five-wicket haul by Assam pacer Krishna Das failed to restrain Tripura from setting a big first innings target before the hosts today.

Tripura piled up 460 runs against the hosts on the second day of their Ranji Trophy Plate Group A tie being played at Nehru Stadium here.

In reply, Assam, who need a first innings lead to ensure a semi-final berth, were 68 for one in 30 overs at draw of stumps.

Resuming at an overnight score of 285 for four off 92 overs, the visitors this morning lost Mumbai professional Nishit Shetty off the third ball of a Krishna Das delivery in the very second over of the day.

Shetty could add just one run to his overnight 164 before being bowled out by Das to put an end to a 148-run fifth wicket partnership with Timir Chanda.

Chanda, however, took up the reins of the Tripura innings and shared two more partnerships with wicket-keeper Rajiv Dutta (22) and southpaw Tushar Saha to put up an individual score of 72 runs before being bowled out by paceman Mrigen Talukdar. Chanda’s 236-ball knock comprised seven hits to the fence.

After Chanda’s dismissal, Saha continued to anchor the innings and shared a last wicket partnership of 82 runs with Jayanta Debnath (36, 5x4) to take the Tripura innings beyond lunch.

Tushar Saha remained unbeaten on 73, slamming 11 fours and a huge six over the boundary.

Krishna Das today accounted for the dismissals of Shetty, Abhijit Dey and Debnath to add to yesterday’s two wickets of Bappa Das and Rajiv Saha.

Spinner Arlen Konwar claimed two wickets for 112 runs to join the100 wicket takers’ club in first class cricket. He is the first spinner from Assam to achieve the feat.

Chasing the huge target, Assam started trying with the fifth opener of the season in the form of under-22 all-rounder Gokul Sharma, who replaced injured S Suresh for the match, with Palashjyoti Das at the other end.

Though the openers started cautiously, Sharma was caught in the slips by Rajiv Saha off a Debnath turner for 13 (2x4).

Palashjyoti Das was batting on 35 (5x4) and Tarjinder Singh on 10 (1x4) at the close of the day’s play.

Brief Scorecard:
Assam 68 for 1 (Palashjyoti Das 35 batting; Tarjinder Singh 10 batting) trail Tripura 460 (Nishit Shetty 165; Timir Chanda 72; Tushar Saha 73 not out; Krishna Das 5/140; Dhiraj Goswami 2/76; Arlen Konwar 2/112) by 392 runs

Posted On: The Telegraph

Another Story:

Ranji Trophy Plate League: Group A

Asom crawl back after batting slump:

Nov 23: Asom fought back strongly after being bowled out by Kerala for 198 runs in their first innings on the first day of the Ranji Trophy Plate Group tie which got under way at the Satindra Mohan Dev Stadium in Silchar today.

Kerala were tottering at 23 for five when the stumps were drawn for the day.

The way the wicket was behaving, as 15 wickets had gone down on the first day of the match, a result is expected. Whoever lakes a lead in the first innings should be in the driver’s seat.

Asom, which won the toss this morning, elected to bat first. But the start was not good for the home side as Souvik Das walked back to the pavilion before Asom was yet to open its account.

The damage was somewhat repaired by S Suresh and Palash Das by adding 70 runs for the second wicket. But once the partnership was broken, wickets started falling like a pack of cards.

Suresh was the top scorer for the side with 57 runs. The other notable contributors were Palashjyoti Das (23), Sadagopan Ramesh (27) and Rajdeep Das (30).

Tinu Yohannan and S Nair bagged three wickets each for Kerala.

It was Dhiraj Goswami who led Asom’s fight-back bagging three wickets for just five runs.

Source: The Sentinel

Ranji Plate Group

Assam vs Vidarbha match drawn:

Nov 18: The Ranji Trophy Plate Group match between Assam and Vidarbha was declared drawn at the end of the fourth and final day at Maligaon Railway Stadium in Guwahati today.

Not a single ball was bowled on the second and third days because of rain and slushy ground conditions and the first day was disrupted by bad weather after only 29 overs had been bowled.

The fourth day today had a full day’s play but the match failed to produce any result. Both sides collected one point each from the drawn match.

Brief Scorecard:
Assam 1st innings: 216 all out in 83.4 overs; Vidarbha 1st innings 126/5 in 38 overs

Both the teams have lost their opening matches. While Assam lost to Gujarat in the away tie, Vidarbha had gone down to Kerala at home tie at Nagpur (Nov 3-6).

Assam now host Kerala from November 23-26.

Assam-Gujarat Plate Division Ranji match

Gujarat well placed against Assam in Ranji Trophy Day One

Ahmedabad, Nov 3:

Despite scoring just 228 runs in the first innings, hosts Gujarat were comfortably placed after sending back four top order batsmen of the visiting Assam team for just 56 runs on the first day of four-day plate division Ranji Trophy match at the Sardar Patel Guajrat Stadium at Motera near here today.

Gujarat, who are aiming to regain their berth in the Elite Group after being relegated to plate division on the basis of their dismal performance in last Ranji season of 2006-07, got into a comfortable position, thanks to their main strike bowler Siddharth Trivedi, who missed the last season due to injury.

The speedster took two early wickets to bring his side back into the game. Trivedi struck in the first over and claimed the wicket of S Bhagawati, Assam's opener, who was brilliantly caught by wicket-keeper Parthiv Patel when team's total was just two runs and his individual contribution was just one run.

As if this was not enough, second opener S Das also made an early exit, at the same score, when he was caught by Niraj Patel off the bowling of Makda.

At this point, Assam's scorecard read two runs for the loss of two wickets. Before the close of play, the visitors lost two more wickets -- N H Bordoloi, who was the second victim of Makda, and Tarjinder Singh, who fell prey to T K Patel. Bordoloi and Singh
made 13 and 19 runs respectively.

When stumps were drawn, the visitors were four down for 56 runs, with S Ramesh and S Sharath unbeaten on individual scores of 16 and zero respectively.

Earlier, Gujarat, who were asked to bat first by rival captain S Sharath, made a slow but steady start. However, debutant opener Hem Joshipura returned to pavilion when he was adjudged LBW off the bowling of S Suresh. His individual score was 14, while his team's total was 23. The other opener, Nilesh Modi, also made early exit by scoring just 17 runs.

Then skipper Parthiv Patel, along with Niraj Patel, gave some steadiness to Gujarat's batting. But at the team total of 88, Parthiv was caught by Singh off Goswami's bowling.
He made a personal contribution of 49 runs, while Niraj scored 31.

Other batsman who played significant innings for the hosts was Digant Popat who hit 63 runs. He was the only bastman to keep one end intact while witnessing the fall of wickets at the other end as Gujarat lost their four bastmen -- number seven to 10 – for just eight runs.

For the visitors, the most successful bowlers were K Das and S Suresh, who took four wickets each for 73 and 46 runs respectively. D S Goswami and A Konwar took one wicket each.

Earlier, both the teams introduced new faces in their squads. Wicket-keeper Rajdeep Das and K Das got their debuts while Gujarat included N Raval in their team.

The Teams:
Gujarat: N D Modi, H R Joshipura, Parthiv Patel (wk; captain), A M Makda, N Raval, M H Parmar, N K Patel, T K Patel, B D Thaker, S K Trivedi

Assam: S Sharath (captain), Rajdeep Das (wk), S Bhagawati, NH Bordoloi, K Das, S Das, DS Goswami, A Konwar, S Ramesh, S Suresh , Tarjinder Singh

Umpires: S L Dendapani, V N Kulkarni
Match Referee: S Chaturvedi

Assam Ranji Trophy team named

Oct. 30: Three cricketers who have donned national colours, all of them from Tamil Nadu including former Test opener Sadagopan Ramesh, have been included in the 15-member Assam Ranji team for the ensuing Ranji matches to be played against Gujarat and Vidarbha.

The other two players are S Sarath and S Suresh. Surprisingly, Sarath, the former Tamil Nadu captain, has also been named as the skipper of the team, while Nishant Bordoloi has been retained as the vice-captain.

The present state team will now have two former Tamil Nadu captains in Ramesh and Sarath in the line-up. Arlen Konwar, who opted out of the ICL contract, has also been included in the team.

The inclusion of the three big names in the state team, in a way, has come up as a respite for the team after three top Ranji players from Assam including Abu Naschim Ahmed and Sujoy Tarafdar decided to join the ICL.

Assam will play their first match against Gujarat on November 3 at Ahmedabad.

Team: S Sarath (captain), Nishant Bordoloi, Sadagopan Ramesh, S Suresh, Saurav Bhagawati, Souvik Das, Tajinder Singh, Palashjyoti Das, Deepak Sarmah, Arlen Konwar, Dhiraj Goswami, Krishna Das, Rajdeep Das, Bitop Mahanta and Mrigen Talukdar.

Coach: Sanat Kumar
Manager: Mukut Das

Assam Sports News

Guwahai ODI tickets sales:
Oct 26: The first quota of tickets for the forthcoming ODI between India and Pakistan to be played on November 5 will be on sale from today. But these tickets will be exclusively for the different affiliated units of the Assam Cricket Association (ACA).

ACA has decided to shift the ticket counter for the general public from the RG Baruah Sports Complex to the Latasil Ground. But the officials of the different district associations will have to collect their quota of tickets from the RG Baruah Sports Complex.

ACA has in all 34 affiliated units and each district would be allotted 282 tickets. On earlier occasions, many district associations had not collected their entire quota but this time the scenario could be completely different as the demand for tickets is beginning to rise with every passing day. People are regularly thronging the RG Baruah Sports Complex for every detail of sale of tickets.

For this ODI, the number of free passes would be only 3500 and the ACA is thinking of providing one card to every former Ranji cricketer of the state.


GSA unhappy over ‘’insufficient’’ number of Indo-Pak ODI tickets:
Oct 26: The Guwahati Sports Association (GSA), the premier sports body of the state, has decided to surrender all the tickets and reception committee member cards which were allotted to them for the forthcoming India-Pakistan ODI – citing “insufficiency”.

GSA president Jatin Bora said that they were allotted 267 tickets and 13 RC cards by the Assam Cricket Association (ACA) which is not at all sufficient. Bora said the GSA has 60 clubs and around 150 members. So it will be a tough task to distribute the tickets and cards among the members. So they have decided to surrender all the tickets and passes to the ODI organisers.

On the other hand, ACA officials said they follow certain guidelines while distributing the tickets to its affiliated units. As they treat all the districts in same manner, they cannot increase the number of tickets to GSA.


Assam-Orissa CK Nayudu tie drawn:
Oct 26: The four-day East Zone CK Nayudu (Under-22) cricket match between Assam and Orissa ended in a draw at the Ispat Stadium, Rourkela today.

Assam were all out for 271 in the second innings, and requiring 42 in five overs for an outright victory, Orissa were 28 for four when the stumps were drawn.

Tejinder Singh scored 120 while Kuldip Pegu contributed 61 in Assam’s second innings.

For Assam Tejinder and Gakul Sharma took two wickets each in Orissa’s second innings.

With this performance, Tejinder’s prospects of making it to the state Ranji squad have brightened.

Brief scores: Assam - 227 and 271 (Tejinder Singh 120, Kuldip Pegu 61); Orissa - 457 for 7 decl and 28 for 4.


Assam U-15 cricket team named:
Oct 26: The Assam Cricket Association (ACA) today named the U-15 State team for the first two matches of the East Zone tournament for the Polly Umrigar Trophy.

The team: Gnan Boro (capt), Jyotiraditya Chetia, Himangshu Konwar, Subhankar Chakravorty, Manasjyoti Gogoi, Sanjaw Brahma, Babul Barman, Jogeswar Bhumij, Nodia Doley, Amlan Baruah, Paragjyoti Das, Prabal Borkotoki, Arpan Dutta, Bitu Ranjan Kalita, Dhritiman Gohain Dutta.

Subhrajit Saikia and Sanjit Das will accompany the team as coach and manager respectively.

Source: The Sentinel; The Assam Tribune