TATA Steel (JSCAIL) 134/5 in 20 overs (Saurabh Tiwary 62, Preetam 21,Satyam 2/28) defeated Mecon Sports Club (JSCAIL) 111/7 in 20 overs (Wasim 37, Harsh 20, Sonu 3/20) by 23 runs
Two of the best cricket stadiums at Jamshedpur, the Keenan Stadium and the Telco ground hosted one of the top tier summer delights of the Jharkhand State Cricket Association, the JSCA institutional league T-20. Some of the top Indian corporate giants had their cricket teams go head to head in the t-20 bonanza.
After 10 days of excitement it was the time for the decider. In the top tier cricket we often see that the table toppers usually lose their way in the knockouts and that’s what happened here too. Both the finalists were ranked second in their groups and both these second ranked teams were up against each other to find out who comes out on top after beating the group toppers in the semi finals.
Tata Steels won the toss and they decided to bat first. They got off to a shaky start as they lost Ashwini Kumar in the third over. Things went worse when they lost Umang just after the powerplays. Although they were struggling, their primary weapon entered the ground only at this point. Saurabh Tiwary, the ex. Indian international entered the ground with the weight of all the expectations.
While the Tata steel kept losing wickets at regular intervals, Saurabh held the other end and ensured a couple of decent partnerships with Preetam and Ujjwal. Keshav Kumar ensured that Saurabh is not starved of strike in the final phase of the inning. Junaid sealed a score of 134 in the first inning as he smoked one into the orbits off the last ball.
Now 135 might seem like a small target to those who did not follow the tournament but those who did, know the fact that only one score of 135 or more was chased down in the entire tournament. After getting a decent start, the collapse followed the Meacon Sports inning. They managed to score 36 in the powerplays but once they lost Sushant, the collapses begin.
Soon after losing Sushant, the Meacon sports lost Kaushal but their biggest blow came in the 10th over when they lost Anirban Chatterjee who happens to be the highest scorer of the team in the tournament. Some late fight-back from Wasim and Harsh was not enough as the Tata Steel sweeped the finals by 23 runs.