I have had the best game ever in Big Ant Cricket franchise. I started playing a 3 team T20 cup. United States, Papua New Guinea, Uganda. First match, was ok. United States (me) decide to bat first in Darren Sammy Cricket Stadium. I put up 200 runs after looking to score 160 at a point. My bowlers were on point as we did not give them anything as we restricted PNG to 132 runs in 20 overs. Easy victory.
Here comes the game of the tournament. Uganda vs United States (me). Uganda win the toss and elect to bat first. The pitch setting for this match was interesting. Had heavy cracks, was completely soft. I thought well 130-140 pitch so need to restrict them to below 130.
They started out brilliantly, kept attacking me despite losing wicket. Got a beautiful LBW where the ball stayed low and came in. They put on a 85 run second wicket partnership. Stupid run out meant a wicket finally fell and one wicket brought 2 more wickets as the pitch was more suitable for bowlers. Felt so natural and genuine as on sluggish pitches like this, one wicket often brings other.
In the end Uganda scored 154 thanks a small middle order cameo. Certainly 20 runs more then what I was hoping.
I came out to bat and straight away Uganda had a spinner start the bowling. The ball was laying low, spinning and turning. I lost Steven Taylor quickly and Jaskaran Malhotra followed next. They made so many decent bowling changes and bowled all bowlers who had no pace on the ball. This made me go into survival mode. While I went into that mode, I kept on losing wickets. I was 28/4 Marty Kain was the only one who I promoted to save Gajanad Singh for later inning blast looking good to bat on that pitch. Kept rotating strike at at one point needed 100 runs in 10 overs with 5 wickets in hand. I kept losing wickets and was 95/8 and lost Cameon Stevenson for 14 on 105/9.
I had almost given up but then came a full toss that I hit out of the park, that ball was a no ball so next free hit, I hit another six, that again was a no ball so got another free hit and hit another six. This way I scored 30 runs in one over. Suddenly instead of requiring 55 in 24, I needed 25 in 18.
I kept my cool, hit an odd boundary here and there, singles and doubles and chased this down. I was sweating till the end. I needed 8 in the last over and hit a boundary, 4 in 5, I hit a single, 3 in 4, I once again hit a single, 2 in 3, single again, 1 in 2 and I hit one an mistimed it to the keeper. SUPER OVER?? Surely??
I somehow found the gap on a delivery that stayed low and hit a single, winning this on the last delivery of the match. Feel bad for Uganda who bowled brilliantly. Also AI got the best bowler to bowl the last over which was amazing to see.
Only complain I have is Muhumuza in Uganda was bowling fantastic had a spell of 3 overs 7 for 1 and had one over remaining. AI bowled another over of the guy who was just hit for 30 runs instead of him. I wish they would have bowled him, might have given me more sweaty palms.
