IISc take BNMIT to the cleaners

3rd January, 2010, IISc Gymkhana Ground, Bangalore: For the first time in many years IISc finally broke free from its infamous second match syndrome, registering their second victory of the IIMB Invitational Cricket Tournament 2010 in as many matches. They are now the front-runners for a berth in the semifinals from their group. The opponents who suffered at their hands were a pitiably dazed BNMIT team.

The visiting side won the toss and elected to bowl. When three quick wickets fell, it seemed like a wise decision. But, Arindam (84 of 45 balls) and Sounik (47 of 41 balls) came together for a stupendous fourth wicket partnership that sealed the visitors fate. In the closing stages of the innings, Teja played some explosive strokes - he hit the biggest six ever seen at IISc ground - to push the total to a mammoth 222/6 in the allotted quota of 25 overs.

BNMIT's reply was meek and lifeless from the start. But to their credit, they did not get bowled out, playing out their overs making 120 for the loss of 8 wickets.

Even in spite of such a comprehensive win, I'm not sure whether IISc will get a bonus point for this one because of the questionable tournament rules which says:

"A winning team that bowls second, and gets the opposition out within 80% of the opponents allotted quota of overs gets 1 bonus point, and the opponent loses 1 point"

That means there are no bonus points for a team bowling second even if they win the match by as many as 102 runs in a 25-over game! That's something for the organizers to look into. I hope it's only an unintentional error that they are willing to rectify. The normal bonus point rules are as follows:

How a "bonus point" is won in an ODI :-

If the winning team can keep their run rate 1.25 times more than the team they beat - they win the bonus point from that match. For example, If Australia bats first and make 250 runs, Indian team needs to win the match at a run rate of (250/50)* 1.25. Which equals to 6.25 runs per over. Which in turn means that India must win the match in 40.1 overs (251/6.25) or of course - less than that.

In case India bats first and needs to win the bonus point after scoring 250 from 50 overs, they need to restrict Australia from scoring more than 187 runs. This is calculated as India's batting run rate was 5. To have a run rate 1.25 time better than Australia, India must not let Australia score more than 3.75 (5-1.25) as a run rate. Thus a total of no more than 187 from 50 Overs for Australia while batting second.

On our part the going has been good. The next match against BMS College of Engineering on Sunday, 10th January, 2010 should test IISc for consistency.

Brief scores:
IISc - 222/6 in 25 overs
(Arindam 84, Sounik 47, Ganapathi 32)
BNMIT - 120/8 in 25 overs
(Debajit 2/15, Arindam 2/17, Arjun 2/40)

Result: IISc won by 102 runs
Man-of-the-match: Arindam Ghosh