Sunil Gavaskar Sixes Report

8^th June 2008

Sitting at the Shangri La hotel for the tournament dinner on Saturday night nobody would have thought that a ball would have been bowled in the 2008 Sunil Gavaskar Invitational Sixes tournament.

Weather outside was beyond awful as it absolutely poured down on Shanghai for the better part of 8 hours.Sunday was a new day however and when the team arrived bright and early for an 8am start the pitch was dry and action was set to get underway.

The Hot Dogs were represented by Ryan Saling, Sam Hunt, David Frame, Chirag Patel, Prerak Patel, Damon Paling and Vikas Laxman.

The first match of the day was against the mortal enemy, the Bashers. Hot Dogs won the toss, which became a theme for the day winning all six tosses, and put the opposition in to bat. Some early wickets by Vikas and two amazing catches from Sam had the Bashers all out for 53 runs. Sam Hunt began his defence of "Man of the Tournament" in earnest with a large innings and retiring after 31 runs. Some big hits from David Frame carried the Hot Dogs to victory with 7 balls to spare, a great start to the day.

The second match brought the SIBA Tigers, who had scored 78 in their previous match. Putting the Tigers into bat they were restricted to just 24 runs off the bat but 24 runs in extras meant the Dogs needed 49 to secure a place in the semifinals. This was easily chased down with 8 balls to spare and it was on to the final group game.

That 3rd game versus the NIIT Warriors was quickly over as well. Putting the Warriors into bat they only managed 42 runs and a quick chase from Sam and David resulted in victory with 10 balls to spare.

This brought the Hot Dogs into the semis, a format for which I am still baffled by. The semis were done in a 3 team round robin that included the Pudong CC and the Bashers.

First up was Hot Dogs and Pudong. Some wayward bowling early on allowed the Pudong side to tonk the Dogs 64 runs as their openers filleted the Hot Dog bowling. The chase came up just short and that meant that the Bashers would have to be beaten again to reach the final.

Putting the Bashers into bat they raced out to early runs off their big left handed opener. Again wayward bowling piled on the extras and the Bashers managed a fine score of 64. A change in the batting saw David and Sam as the openers and they did not disappoint. Big sixes from David and finely place boundaries and some timely wides saw the Dogs through to the final with 7 balls to spare.

The finals versus the Pudong side was a daunting task. With fading light the Hot Dogs decided to open the batting and posted a respectable total of 52. Sam Hunt retiring yet again and some runs late from Chirag bolstered the innings. In the end the Pudong big guns proved to be too much for the Hot Dogs as they claimed victory on the penultimate ball of the tournament. Fine bowling in the final from Sam Hunt and Vikas almost saw the Hot Dogs lift title hardware but it wasn't to be.

All in all a great days cricket. "Man of the Tournament Honors" went to Sam Hunt for the second consecutive year and runner up glassware all around for the Hot Dogs.

A long day but impressive showing none the less. Considering that in all matches except those against Pudong the Dogs never saw the 5th bowler from the opposition.