A Cricket Match

I am Soham Sinha and study at St.Thomas School in Jharsuguda. It is a reputed school in the city. This year I have been appointed as the captain of my school cricket team. 

Our school principal, Mrs.Sheeba Daniel is a visionary woman. She gives equal attention to both sports and studies.

She has arranged a reputed coach a few months back to groom our team in the art of playing cricket. By practicing for only a few months only, I can boast with humbleness that our team is quite prepared to take on any other cricket team in this area of our State.

If anyone should deem my assertion as an empty boast, I hereby relate to you a match which our team played with a rival team recently.

It was last Sunday only when this match was played with the team of St.Mary's school, another school of high repute. It was a friendly match with our school team. 

The match was played in a neutral venue, in the OMP parade ground. Their team won the toss and decided to field first. All the players of both the sides and the umpires and the referee took up their positions.

The referee blew the whistle and the match started at sharp 10 am. Our openers Sidhartha and Ronak reached the pitch looking confident. As the first ball was thrown by the bowler named Suresh, Sidhartha sent the ball high up in the sky. Clearly, it was six. The playground which was fully packed resounded with high rounds of applause.

In this way, Sidhartha amassed seventy-six runs. However, to everyone's dismay, he was caught out by Rohan of St. Mary's team. Ronak, however, continued and played cautiously and with patience. He scored 39 runs before he was caught behind the wicket.

Before lunch, our team had scored 269 runs in all in 40 overs. After lunch, the St.Mary's team came in to bat. Our team soon realized that the opposition had good openers as they accumulated a quick 90 runs in the first ten overs. 

My teammates began to show signs of nervousness. But I gave them hope to say we would put pressure on them by bringing our best bowler, Sushant. I also brushed up fielding by changing the players and setting up the field as per the bowler's wish. As expected, our star bowler, Sushant, showed his merit and took five wickets in just five of his overs.

The rival team was suddenly reeling at 124 for five after twenty overs. However, their batting was provided with the much-needed stability by Rahul Yadav, their star batsman. He batted like a pro. Alone he made 101 runs and was not out till the end. However, our bowlers made inroads at regular intervals resulting in their team becoming all out in just 35 overs. They made a close 249 runs. 

We won the match by twenty runs. All the team members hugged one another and also applauded Rahul and his teammates for putting up a good show. There was rejoicing all around. 

The principals of both the schools came on stage and announced the prizes. I collected the winner's trophy. And the man of the match obviously went to Rahul, though Sidhartha and Sushant of our team had also performed very well. But Rahul had batted under pressure and single-handedly taken his team very close to a win. So it was a well-deserved reward for him.

Thus our team won against a good opponent and we hope to play more matches in the future.