Akron after a long time, against all odds won the toss and chose to field first. Akron had one of their finest bowling starts of this season with opening bowlers getting a wicket each. Venkatesh, in his first over, bowled Deepak Dhiman with an inswinger while Vamsi sent the stumps for a ride claiming the wicket of Sunny Dhillon.  Farrukh Khan and Babar Najam were the new batsmen at the crease. Both batsmen looked determined to build a strong partnership. They cautiously worked the balls around for ones and twos with occasional boundaries. The first power play was dominated by Akron. Prashanth replaced Vamsi for first change and he was finding it difficult to get his lengths right. Venkatesh was given his fifth straight over but he dropped his length short and was taken for runs. Farrukh and Baber with their clean powerful hitting got things going for All Stars. Rohit replaced Venkatesh but found it difficult to contain the flowing runs. ACC started rotating bowlers with Nitin and Peri introduced in succession. Peri finally got the much need breakthrough for Akron. In his second ball, Babar was caught at deep midwicket by Venkatesh. Next batsman, Gurpreet Singh, was trying to get set but Nitin got him bowled. All Stars had a set batman in one end but was unable to build partnerships. Nitin and Peri bowled tight lines to put pressure on the batsmen. Jagga Singh was caught at long on by Venkatesh in Peri’s bowling and Ashu Chaturvedi was caught by Prashanth in Nitin’s bowling. Farrukh was still going strong hitting ball around the ground. Vamsi was reintroduced into the attack and he successfully bowled Farrukh. Suhas Cherukuri was bowled by Nitin, becoming Nitin’s third victim.

Ohio All Stars scored 182 runs for loss 8 wickets in 35 overs. Top scorers: Farrukh Khan 85 (72) and Babar Najam 33 (42). Top Bowlers: Nitin 3/41, Peri 2/29 and Vamsi 2/27.

In response, Akron took a ‘no mercy’ approach in batting. Rohit initially put a show of his defensive strokes while Peri was brutally assaulting the bowlers. The opening pair went onto to get their third fifty partnership. Peri reached 50 at a strike rate of nearly 200. On the other end, Rohit showed his class with some delightful stroke play. Peri fell to Gurpreet caught by the keeper. Uday, who wasn’t 100% fit, was next batsmen. He played confidently all around field. Uday was caught at gully trying to slash a wide ball. Gurpreet Singh was the bowler. Abishek was sent at second down. He was bowled in his first ball from Gurpreet. Akron lost two wickets back to back and found itself in trouble. Kiran Mitra was promoted up the order and he ensured Akron did not lose further wickets. Rohit and Kiran played good shots all around the ground and got Akron to finish line.

Lakshmikant Peri was awarded the man of the match

Akron Cricket Club chased 183 for loss of 3 wickets in 23.4 overs. Top scorers: Rohit Kankaliya 85 (69) and Lakshmikant Peri 55 (29). Top bowler: Gurpreet Singh 3/39.

Akron rebounded brilliantly after an embarrassing defeat in their previous game. That being said, fielding efforts have to improve significantly.  Also, extras provided by bowlers is alarming and it is something that should be worked on.

DMI Orange won the toss and choose to field. ACC started the innings with Rohit and Dinesh while Baljinder singh and Vijay Bhaskar opened the bowling attack for DMI orange. DMI orange bowled in good areas troubling ACC batsman. In the third over of the innings Rohit got out to a beautiful out swinger from Baljinder Singh. Uday who is having a dream season, came to the crease and was comfortable right from ball one. Dinesh on the other hand was struggling to middle the ball and eventually got out trying to loft the ball over long on in Sameer’s bowling. Then came Abhishek who along with Uday tried to stabilize the innings for ACC. They batted decently with occasional ones and two’s and ACC were 38-2 after 12 overs. After the first break, DMI orange introduced spin attack. Abhishek in a plan to accelerate the innings hit one over long off and got out in Nabil’s bowling. He was caught by Sameer Kulkarni who ran to his right to complete an excellent catch. Vamsi was promoted top of the batting line up in a hope to accelerate the innings, but was gone LBW to the leg spinner Vishvesh. ACC was in deep trouble and needed a partnership badly. Sudheer came to the crease and was rotating the strike along with Uday before his innings was ended by Baljinder. Uday on the other hand was comfortable rotating the strike and hitting occasional boundaries. At the end of 24 overs ACC was 104-5.  Madhu walked in to the crease and took a couple of singles before he was runout by Vishvesh. In the 26^th over of the innings Uday completed his 50 runs and his stay at the crease was ended by Sameer Kulkarni. At this time ACC was 110-7. The lower order did not survive for much time. Venkatesh, Nitin and Kiran got out to Sameer’s bowling and ACC was all out for 129 in 29.5 overs.

For ACC top scorer was Uday with 52 runs. Sameer Kulkarni took 5 wickets

DMI orange started the innings with Thiag and Varad. Opening bowling for ACC was really good from Venkatesh and Vamsi. They created a couple of chances in the initial overs. ACC did not capitalize on the created chances due to poor fielding efforts. The batsmen who were struggling for the first 5 overs suddenly started playing aggressive game and it took ACC 11 overs to get the first breakthrough. Thiag who was trying to sweep the ball was caught by Uday in Rohit’s bowling. DMI orange were 71-1 in 11.3 overs. First ball after the break Varad was gone LBW in Rohit’s bowling. Then came in Sandeep Kondapally who along with Nabil took the game away from ACC. The bowlers couldn’t do much as the fielding effort was poor and there were not many runs to defend. Nabil got out to Venkatesh when DMI needed 5 runs. Karthik and Sandeep took DMI orange home with 12 overs to spare.

Thiag (33), Varad (26), Nabil (28), Sandeep (21) were the top scorers for DMI orange while for ACC Rohit took 2 wickets and Venkatesh took 1 wicket.

It was a bizarre performance from ACC. Only 3 batsmen scored in double digits. Poor batting and poor fielding efforts are the main reasons for the defeat.