ISCI defends JCA cricket championship

ISCI Cricket Club successfully defended their JCA championship on Sunday with a solid performance against Indorama CC at Cibubur in East Jakarta.

Indorama won the toss and predictably chose to bat first, putting ISCI in the unfamiliar position of having to chase the runs to achieve victory.

After a nervy start by the ISCI fielding team the bowlers slowly exerted their dominance in the game, bowling Indorama out for only 130 in the penultimate over. Dean Hewitt took 3-34, John Stevenson (2-24) again putting in a tidy performance with the ball, and Andy Foulds taking three catches behind the stumps.

Indorama's batsmen were never able to put the ISCI bowlers under any real pressure, and found it hard to go on the offensive. Shirish Rangole was the best of the bunch scoring a good 32.

In reply, ISCI got off to a bad start and soon found themselves at 13-2, before the experienced John Stevenson (35) and Wilfred Schultz (16) put in 50 runs for the third wicket, building the foundation for the successful run chase.

Indorama bowled well and always made it hard for the ISCI batsman, maintaining a close attacking field and trying to force the ISCI batsman to take risks and go for runs over the top, as a result ISCI steadily fell behind the required run rate but always had wickets in hand, and eventually made it home with over four overs to spare,

Andy Foulds scored 26 not out off 17 balls, and hit three four's in the 31st over which finally took the game out of Indorama's grasp, and left Mohazzam Shah in his last-ever game for ISCI to hit the winning run.

In the plate final played last weekend, India XI beat Senayan CC by five wickets. India XI won the toss and put Senayan CC to bat, who were only able to field a team of eight players for the plate final. Having started off well Senayan CC ended up with a score of 171 for seven in 32.2 overs.

India XI got off to a shaky start and were at one stage 23 for two, but some steady innings by the middle order batsman and the open field made it easy for India XI to reach 172 in 32 overs.

The winning teams will be presented with the JCA trophy by the former Australian cricketer Dean Jones at the annual awards ceremony at the Le Meriden Hotel in Jakarta on May 15th.

Interested cricket enthusiasts who wish to attend the awards ceremony and annual dinner can contact JCA at prakash@cbn.net.id.