That Match!!

For some strange things that have been going on in my life for the past few days, I have started reminiscing the good times. The good old days when everything was simple, uncomplicated and a lot of fun. The thought took me to one of the cricket match I had played when I was in class 7th. Now at that point of time in my life winning meant everything to me. It was fructification of all the effort and hard work I had put in. It was the vindication of my belief in my talent, my ability and myself. So coming back to the match it was between my team "The Warriors" and another local team whose name we never cared to remember. The team was furious and very methodical in its approach. They had a genuine fast bowler in Varun, an all rounder in Little and fantastic leg-spinner in Anupam, who was also the captain of the team. On the other hand our team consisted of bits and pieces players. We had players from the age group of 3 to 13, some who could barely walk. So we had quite a task in front of us.The team heavily depended on me and Ankit. We both called ourselves all-rounders, due to our ability to perform either with the ball or the bat, never both together. All we had was an insane belief in our self, a belief that we were the best! Anyway the match started sharp at the scheduled time which was 2:oo pm. It was a 15 over a side match. Anupam's team won the toss and chose to bat first. Today it was one of the typical bad bowling day for both Ankit and me. We got hit left right and center. The only consolation was that owing to our bad performance with the ball there was a chance that we would bat well. Anyway they scored 120 in their 15 overs and we required 121 in 15 overs at an asking rate of 8.07. It was a difficult task made even worse by the fact that Ankit was injured during the match. Ankit and our burly neighbour Deepak took guard. Now Deepak was the most important member of our team because it was his bat that was used by all. His scores never reached double digit in his entire career. But today was a new day. We had told him that a score of 10 from him will be heavily rewarded. As the rule of lbw wasn't there we told him to use his size to the advantage. Varun took his 25 metre un up and came speeding in, much to the discomfort of our trembling opener Deepak. Off went the ball only to kiss the bails . 0 for 1, hardly a score we needed. I walked with heavy booing in the background. It was me who had to perfrom, was the thought that ran into my mind. Ankit was anyway limping, so it had to be the aerial route today. It's said that in cricket there are some days when everything you do clicks, when every shot you take goes past the boundary line. That day was just one of those days. Soon Ankit and me were in full flow. Runs came thick and fast. We achieved the target in 9.1 overs and consequently won by 9 wickets and made a hefty profit of Rs.10 per member. It was the biggest victory and a moral boast like no other. Vishal the youngest member all of 3 years suggested we go and have cold-drinks.It was still an hour to go before it would be too dark to see. We decided that we wanted to practice, cos celebration could wait another day, we still have the finals to play. And we had to WIN because loosing was not an option!!!