Since HS14 have graduated, a power vacuum has set in: who will be the next greats of the department? The PhDs stake a strong claim to this throne. As the only team with a trophy in their cabinet participating in this year’s edition, they will attempt to double their trophy count this time out. Since 2015, it has been a steady rise for the team, and they have only gone from strength to strength. Last year, it took a herculean effort from a perennially underrated HS15 team to dump them out from the tournament, the highlight being one of the all time great innings by Vimal. A magnum opus was needed to sucker punch them. That alone should tell the tale of how immensely strong and well balanced their team is. This year is also the last for a bunch of core players who got together way back in 2015, and so they would want to make this into a memorable final hurrah.
Last year’s story : Semifinalists.
The Team
Very well balanced. However, batting does depend on a few big hitters. Bowling is the most balanced without question. Who knows? – some surprises may be in store. Nishant, Renjith, Anil, Manoj, and Jithin make up an allrounder core of five which is often deadly. Their weaknesses are few in the light of their many strengths, which is the result of a very dependable unit. It remains to be seen how the other teams deal with this five pronged threat, which may very well be too much to contain for most teams. Any win against them will most probably be a battle of titanic proportions, and it will require guile and brilliance to pull it off. In addition, Vani is more than a decent batswoman and is often quite tricky to face with the ball in hand as well, so one must be quite careful when facing up to them. In a team like this, there seems to be nowhere to hide. And that, my friends, is the scariest part of this team: obvious weak links are few, and thus, one must be careful.
Players to look out for:
The five as stated above. I do not know about the new arrivals, however. Nishant seems to be the main man for them though. A big hitter par excellence with an effortless ability to clear any of the boundaries of Sangam regardless of Sangam, containing him will be key to the opposition’s success chances. Nevertheless, he is just one part of the story. The aforementioned four are all behind him, and it is going to be hard to dislodge them.
Final Thoughts
They have already done it once, so I don’t see why they shouldn’t be able to pull off a deja vu. However, they do have a monkey on their back from last year – the infamous semi final loss. That memory alone might set the cat among the pigeons. Never count them out. They are the favourites along with HS16. Let’s see what happens. To the field, gentlemen, to the field.
Article by Simha Y. N.
Article 19 