Senayan CC bests JCA annual meet

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Six local and two overseas teams from Malaysia and Singapore took part in the Jakarta Cricket Association (JCA) annual tournament on Oct. 4 and Oct. 5.

The Jakarta International Sixes 2003 Cricket Tournament was held at the Cycon Cricket Club in Cibubur, East Jakarta.

The newly formed Jawa Tengah CC from Semarang participated in the tournament for the first time.

The other five teams were all from Jakarta and made up of players from the JCA.

The competition was staged in two parts. On the Saturday the teams were split into two groups, playing each team once within the group to determine the final seedings for the knock-out stages that were played on the Sunday.

The winners of the knockout stage played a semifinal for the Sixes Cup and the losers played for the Sixes Plate.

Senayan CC from Jakarta, captained by Vibhu Prakash, was crowned the champion of the tournament after beating Penang CC from Malaysia, captained by V Murali, in a one-sided final.

The Plate competition was won by Bojangles CC from Singapore, captained by Amar Hanspal, in a tightly contested match against Rebels CC of Jakarta, captained by Marten Eddy.

One of the best games of the tournament was the emotionally charged semi-final where Senayan CC played India XI, which produced the turning point of the tournament, Sachin Gopalan taking two wickets in the fourth over of the India innings to dramatically change the course of the match.

Penang CC beat Perkasa CC in a high scoring semi-final. Senayan CC easily won the final, posting 65 off their allotted five overs. Penang CC never really came close requiring 35 runs off the last over, an almost impossible ask.

The tournament saw a total of 2294 runs scored, the winner of the Best Batsman award was Sandeep Puri of Bojangles CC Singapore who scored 166 runs in six games, never losing his wicket.

A total of 44 wickets fell during the tournament for which the best bowler awards were awarded jointly to Praveen of Jawa Tenggah CC and Sachin Gopalan of Senayan CC. A total of 75 sixes were hit by the players, with Chad Paul of Rebels CC walking away with the Sixer of the Tournament award for hitting 10 sixes.

The award for the Player of the Tournament went to Deepak Appaiah of Senayan CC for his highly consistent performance in bowling, batting and fielding.