Izaara Cup 2017

Izaara Day & Night Cricket Fiesta 2017 – an engrossing cricket event held at Yorkers Cricket ground on 26 Aug 17, with corporate teams and clubs participating in the tournament.

The modified and interesting format played in a single group this year made for some good competitive play and an interesting day filled with some impressive sportsmanship on display.

The tournament was played for 3 categories this year. The round robin games led to all the eliminator rounds.

Almost all the round robin games were close; with victory margins ranging from 6 runs in one game to 48 runs in another. The victory margins while chasing the scores ranged from 2 balls to 13 to spare and 4 to 8 wickets in hand.

There were some prolific shots, with 56 boundaries as Fours and 78 long sixes during the tournament. The longest boundaries flew over the ground on either side of the square by Alam Mohammad of Meiji Mavericks who hit 11 6’s in total.

At the end of round robin, Three teams HP, Navig8 and Meiji Mavericks teams ended up with a tie on points .The ranking was hence decided by the Net run rate.

The first qualifier round, saw the MCC Teams fighting it out with the MCC tigers giving way to the MCC lions who finally made it to the 3rd place.

The 2nd qualifier saw Navig8 lose to Meiji Mavericks, a big comeback for them given their earlier defeat to Navig8.

The third place was played between MCC Lions and Navig8, with the former winning convincingly and grabbing the third spot.

HP got the finals slot with a good win over Navig8 in the last round robin game, which changed the equation of the tournament .

The Finals were played between HP and Meiji Mavericks Meiji Mavericks with their sharp bowling on the field and batting to match clinched their first ever Izaara title in 2017. Team HP put up a good fight with 30 Runs on the board but could not match Meiji’s stellar performance .An extremely well deserved victory given their start off in the tournament.

Adding to the exciting day was some good lively music and enthusiastic cheers and whistles of the workers who sat around watching the game like enthusiastic spectators of an IPL game .

The joie–de-vivre and camaraderie extended by all the teams made for a fabulous day filled with sunshine, laughter and high spirits not forgetting some great individual performances .

Danish Shadab of MCC Lions was judged Best Batsmen with 117 runs to his statistics, which included 4’sX11 and 6’sX4. Let’s not forget Danish was also the Player of the tournament in 2015.

Rahul Baberwal of MCC Lions was judged the Best Bowler of the tournament with his statistics of 6 Overs with 32 runs and 5 Wickets.

Alam Mohammad of Meji Mavericks a find of the tournament and for Singapore, was adjudged the Player of the tournament with 107 Runs, including 4’sX2, 6’sX11 with his bat.

The statistics above showed that both batsmen and bowlers equally contested in the tournament. It further confirmed the high standards of the players and the games in the tournament, which one has always expected of the Izaara tournament, year after year.

Izaara would like to thank the technical team from SCA led by Umpire Senthil, Mr Harnam Singh of Yorker for all his support and Capt and Mrs Batura of Sinoda Shipping for giving away the winners Trophy and a big thank you to my family.

Izaara looks forward to welcoming the teams back and new ones in Izaara 2018.