HS17 and HS13 featured in the last match of the evening. The crowds, having shown up for the friendly match between the faculty and the students (the audience dutifully cheering for their respective camps), now began to disperse. When the match began, the remainder of the audience was gathered at one ends of the ground, all waiting, mildly interested.
The game saw some rather excellent batting from Sannihit, who hit a couple of sixes. The relaxed atmosphere was further made so by a group of students playing music, singing along, and yelling comments to the players on the pitch. Dilip batted as well, but walked off for a bit before returning to play. The players on HS17 were rather good as well, and the gathered batch was quite enthusiastic.
The first innings seemed to drag, concluding only at around half-ten or so. The second innings picked up a bit, and saw Indu score a run or two, being furiously cheered on. The yells of delight accompanying a six being hit never failed to scare a dog off the pitch.
Toward the end of the game, at the end of the ninth over, HS17 realised that their opponents had a single girl on their team. Apart from Saba, there was no other girl on the HS13 team, despite the rules mandating that two girls be present on each team. They earnestly brought this up, and yells for the disqualification of HS13 from the match could be heard. The umpire, Biyas, later sent an apology via an email, which HS17 accepted with good grace. HS13 won the match, qualified to the semi-finals, and hopefully are not borne too great a grudge against by HS17.
Report by Shweta Venkatesh.
Article 19 