Fresh off our 40 over championship on Friday, the Cannons entered the long weekend in high spirits for a busy weekend with 9 matches on the schedule.
Division 1 had two games against East Coast CC. The second would be abandoned due to rain and a wet outfield, but not before we had one of our best T20 run chases in our history on Saturday. After conceding 188 for the loss of only 5 wickets (would have been much higher if not for Zeeshan Ansari's 4/21 off 4), a great team batting effort saw us chase them down with 4 balls remaining. Danish Khan top scored with a quickfire 33 off 15 at the top, Zee capped a great all round game with 32 off 16 near the end, while Shivam Verma (30 off 19), Rudesh Audikesavalu (24 off 19) and Sagar Mandhan (19* off 16) all chipped in vital knocks. Scorecard
Division 2 entered the weekend on a 4 game losing streak and needing wins to make the playoffs. Saturday saw us against East Coast CC, and our bowlers did a great job restricting them to 6/137 off 20. Priyank Trivedi took 2/27 off 4, while Nihar Shah was economical taking 1/17 off 4. Our chase started poorly as we fell to 4/58, but Priyank was joined by skipper Tushar Sehgal and together they turned the game in our favour putting on 66 in less than 7 overs. Tushar hit a game changing 42 off 20, while Priyank finished a great game unbeaten on 42 off 34 as we won with 5 wickets and 12 balls to spare. Scorecard
Monday had Div 2 against 1st placed Titans. Bowling first, our quicks were tight in the powerplay, before left arm spinner Arshpreet Singh got the breakthrough. The next 7 wickets would amazingly all be taken by Nihar, who finished his 4 over spell with a club record 7/15. Receiving support from his fielders for his early wickets, he then put the icing on the cake with a stunning googly to take his 6th, before etching his name in the record books with an LBW for his 7th. Titans recovered from this putting on 44 for the 9th wicket to end at 8/140 off 20. After the loss of an early wicket, Nisarg Patel was at his best with 49 off 35 balls including 5 sixes, dominating a 78 run partnership for the 2nd wicket with Andrew Irving (36 off 35). Dhruv Mohta (10 off 6) and Grant Whitcombe 25 off 16) continued the momentum, and we passed their score with 10 balls and 5 wickets to spare. A much needed win that moves us into 3rd spot. Scorecard
Division 3 had three games over the weekend, and would end with three losses, but not through a lack of effort. Saturday saw us suffer a 9 wicket loss to East Coast CC, where we were thoroughly outplayed. Scorecard.
Sunday our batsmen bounced back to hit 7/165 off our 20, Saruabh Shreekumar (45 off 46) and Paul Chan Chow (33 off 23) top scoring. Strikers managed to chase it down with 3 balls left, Maryo John our best with 2/23 off 4. Scorecard
Monday had us with another clash against East Coast CC. Paul was the best of the bowlers with 3/21 off 3 as they accumulated 6/167 off 20. At 8/108 off 14.4, it looked like our chances were next to nil, but sipper Kazi Rahman (32 off 17) and Kanwaljeet Singh (25 off 22) combined for 55 runs off only 26 balls to bring the equation down to 5 off 7. Unfortunately we lost both off successive balls to fall just short of a win that the team's effort definitely is deserving of. Scorecard
Division 4 had a tough outing against East Coast CC, conceding 8/181 off the 20. Skipper Raj Suhagiya and Tommy Upton would finish with identical figures of 2/33 off 4. In reply, we could only manage 92 all out from 13.5 overs, Tommy top scoring with 19 off 13. Scorecard. A chance to bounce back from that on Monday was sadly lost due to rain.