The Hindu : Sport : Inzamam guides Hyderabad Heroes home

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Monday, Dec 10, 2007
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Inzamam guides Hyderabad Heroes home

Vijay Lokapally

Belligerent Cairns lays Mumbai Champs low

PANCHKULA: Azhar Mahmood did his best. He got past Ian Harvey’s defence to hit the stumps. The bail lifted tantalizingly and then nicely settled into its original position. The batsman was on two.

Harvey, however, could not pass his luck on to the team, Chennai Superstars, and ended up in the losing camp as Inzamam-ul-Haq gave a glimpse of his awesome abilities to fashion Hyderabad Heroes’ seven-wicket victory.

This was Superstars’ first defeat in four matches and a result that enhanced Heroes’ hope to find a semifinal berth in the Indian Cricket League.

The most explosive moments were reserved for the evening when Chris Cairns played the most destructive innings of the tournament to improve Chandigarh Lions chances of a semifinal spot with a 58–run win over Mumbai Champs.

The bowlers could do little as Cairns, in an inspired performance, steered his side to the first 200-plus total. His savage 70 off 26 balls included seven sixes and five fours.

Even good deliveries were belted with disdain as Avinash Yadav and Rakesh Patel discovered the hard way.

Mumbai was never in the race once Brian Lara was out for nine, his previous scores being 0, 4 and 3.

If the bail had not let down Mahmood, the contest would have been over much quicker. Interestingly, one of the commentators, Pat Symcox, had enjoyed enormous luck in a bizarre incident ten years ago in a Test match at Faisalabad. According to V.R. Rajan of www.cricketarchive.com , Mushtaq Ahmed’s ball curled past Symcox’s bat and went through the stumps.

Back home, Gursharan Singh’s career would have been almost ‘over’ in 1982 when Mohinder Amarnath included him in the Delhi team for the grand Ranji Trophy final against Karnataka despite two successive scores of zero.

On 11, Gursharan stood dazed as the ball, from a defensive prod off B. Vijayakrishna, spun back to hit the stumps. The bail rose and returned to its groove. Gursharan hit 101 as Delhi chased 706 to win and later went on to wear the India cap too.

Blistering attack

Set a target of 163, Hyderabad Heroes needed no such luck as Inzamam and Abdur Razzaq launched a blistering attack. Their 79-run partnership left Superstars stranded.

Reflecting on the match, Hemang Badani, who smashed a 13-ball 31 with three sixes for Superstars, said, “That’s the difference between a good player and a great player. We have been learning from the foreign stars the true meaning of professionalism. When we returned to the dressing room, our captain (Stuart Law) told us not to lose heart. We had done well but the opposition did better.” Badani could not have summed it up better too.

Harvey smashed a brilliant 63 off 55 balls with six fours and two sixes and his 85-run stand with Law (44 off 36 balls with six fours) was built on that early piece of luck. No wonder, Harvey’s nickname is Freak.

The scores: Chennai Superstars 162 for four in 20 overs (Ian Harvey 63 not out, Stuart Law 44, Hemang Badani 31 not out) lost to Hyderabad Heroes 165 for three in 17.5 overs (Inzamam-ul-Haq 44 not out, Abdur Razzaq 40 not out, Anirudh Singh 31).

Chandigarh Lions 219 for four in 20 overs (Chris Cairns 70, Munish Sharma 37 not out, Imran Farhat 34) beat Mumbai Champs 181 for five in 20 overs (Dhiraj Jadhav 58 not out, Kiran Powar 54).

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