Depleted, but spirited Legends derails the Stormers juggernaut

Sometimes when you know you have a handicap, you could put in more efforts to surmount the impact of that handicap, and then you would end up becoming stronger than what you’ve ever thought you would become. Depleted off its strength due to the non-availability of some of its main players, Legends was looking down the barrel when it was pitted against the Stormers juggernaut in the 8th match of CCL. But the spirited Legends put in a big effort and defeated the strong Stormers by 8 wickets.

Winning the toss Legends decided to field first. Stormers started with their time-tested opening pair of Ranjith E and Vijai. They started slowly against measured bowling spells of Mahadevan, Saleem and Ajith. In the six overs the aforementioned bowlers bowled, only 2 fours were hit. It seemed that the Stormers batsmen were waiting for what they assumed to be the weak links in the Legends bowling attack, the other two bowlers Legends will use to complete the allotted overs. But the best part of the game was when Prasanth bowled a great spell of bowling, where he sent back both openers and Gopalan Marimuthu. Renjith K tried to improve the scoring rate but he was out run out when a throw from Arun VS found the batsman short of the crease. The Stormers appeared never to be in their best form and almost all batsmen found it difficult to score freely. But Joseph was an exception as he hit 16 runs from 4 balls he faced that included two lusty blows to six. In the allotted 10 overs, Stormers was able to rake up just 76 runs with a loss of 5 wickets.

Mediocre targets can often be tricky to chase and Legends’ openers knew it all too well and hence they started rather cautiously. Against a robust bowling attack like that of Stormers, one needs to be extra vigilant to not lose wickets, because once you lose a wicket or two, you would be opening the flood gates and you could lose wickets in a heap. Openers Mahadevan and Saleem found it difficult to raise the scoring rate against the miserly bowling of Renjith K and Anas. Run rate was creeping up for the Legends and in the search of big runs Mahadevan lost his wicket to a brilliant delivery from Anas. After the loss of the first wicket Saleem found an able partner in Henry and the duo set out earnestly for the chase. In one over Saleem was able to hit 27 runs and that changed the complexion of the game. By then the run rate got manageable for the Legends and they got home with 5 balls to spare. Saleem remained unbeaten on 47 and took his team to a well deserved win against the mighty Stormers.

Saleem was adjudged Man of the Match.

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