Sunny Sandhu scored 61 (44b, 6x4, 2x6), and left-arm spinners Sachin Rathi (three for 21) and N. Selva Kumaran (three for 32) starred with the ball to help Salem Spartans beat iDream Tiruppur Tamizhans by eight runs at the India Cement Company ground here on Saturday.
A highlight of Sunny’s innings was his back-to-back sixes to deep midwicket and long on off Trilok Nag in the 15th over. He also bowled with the new ball, and conceded 21 runs in three overs.
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Testing conditions
Expert analysts spoke about the players having to contend with the wind at the ground in the past, and on Saturday it was the same. At the Pavilion end, the wind blew at 29 kmph from right to left - In the first over of the match, Trilok Nag got seemingly exaggerated swing away from the left-handed Aravind.
The highest temperature read 37 degrees at the start of play, but it seemed and felt hotter than that. The pitch was bound to be sapped of any moisture and get parched. And even as early as the first delivery of the fourth over of the match, the ball produced a puff of dust as it pitched.
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Spin factor
Drying pitch and a seemingly crumbling or loosening top surface indicated the strip would be spin-friendly, as it has often been in the past.
Tiruppur’s left-arm spinners Ajith Ram (one for 20) and Sai Kishore (two for 31) went for 5 runs and 7.75 runs an over, while Salem’s left-arm spinners Sachin and Selva went for 5.25 and 8 an over.
Wobble seam
Both Trilok Nag’s wickets came off the wobble-seam deliveries. It is unclear whether he intended for those deliveries to wobble. The first one wobbled a bit and moved in to take Kaushik Gandhi’s inside edge through to the keeper. The second one, in the 15th over, wobbled more than the first and moved into S. Abishek through the gap between his bat and pad to get him bowled.
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Mixing it up
Tiruppur’s P. Bhuvaneswaran mixes up his length and pace even with the new ball. While he had mixed up his length when bowling up front in his fifer against Nellai Royal Kings (five for 17) this season, he tried the wobble-seam delivery that moved away from the right-hander and the off-cutter and the short delivery in his second over (fourth over of the innings) on Saturday. All this, with the swinging new ball and the wind to aid the swing!
At the death, he prefers bowling the wide line, and slowing down the pace - off-cutters and back-of-the-hand deliveries. Muhammed Adnan Khan and Akash Sumra fell off his slower balls at the end of the innings.
The downside is such bowlers may go for heavy runs at times, and even on Saturday, he’d gone for 12 an over.
Dindigul beats Nellai
Vimal Khumar (62, 53b, 3x4, 4x6) and Shivam Singh (51, 39b, 7x4) engaged in an 117-run first-wicket partnership as Dindigul Dragons beat Nellai Royal Kings by seven wickets in the second match of the day.
Vimal Khumar hit four sixes and there were two remarkable things about those - his use of footwork to off-spinner Lakshay Jain, and clearing the boundary down the ground since it is the longest part of the ground. He hit Lakshay for sixes over long on, long off, and straight boundaries, and Poiyamozhi for a six over the straight boundary.
There was a brief nervous time for Dindigul after Vimal and Shivam were dismissed, when Sonu Yadav with his yorkers and Poiyamozhi with his slower balls tried to get Nellai back into the contest.
The scores: Salem Spartans 155 in 20 overs (Sunny Sandhu 61, H. Trilok Nag 2/21, P. Bhuvaneswaran 3/48, Sai Kishore 2/31) bt iDream Tiruppur Tamizhans 147/9 in 20 overs (Sai Kishore 26, Sachin Rathi 3/21, N. Selva Kumaran 3/32); Nellai Royal Kings 159/7 in 20 overs (Arun Karthick 39, N.S. Harish 34 n.o., Subodh Bhati 2/32, M. Mathivannan 2/25) lost to Dindigul Dragons 160/3 in 19.3 overs (Vimal Khumar 62, Shivam Singh 51).
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