Wadia Ghandy won the Mumbai ELP Masters Cricket Cup 2010 yesterday in a reversal of last year's final against Economic Laws Practice's (ELP) powerful batting line-up.
The Wadia Ghandy team chased down ELP's strong target of 66 runs in only five overs through a steady stream of singles and doubles, interspersed with strategic boundaries to seal the deal.
Wadia captain, batsman and senior associate in litigation Sagar Divekar said: "It was a high target but I think we played sensibly…
"It was a team effort and everyone plays and enjoys themselves."
DSK Legal, ELP, Nishith Desai & Associates (NDA) and Wadia Ghandy triumphed over 16 law firm teams in the group stages where five overs of five balls each were played.
The knock-out rounds each consisted of six overs of six balls.
The semi-finals saw Wadia catch up with DSK's 43 runs, after an initial neck-on-neck race, but after a series of fours Wadia swept past DSK's scores in only four overs.
In the second semi ELP laid down a huge target of 74 runs for NDA, which ultimately proved to be just too much for the side that closed at only 53 after six overs.
ELP therefore went into the finals as favourites after winning the competition both times when it was held in the last two years and boasting a starting batting line-up consisting of former Ranji Trophy player Kirat Damani and managing partner Rohan Shah.
Indeed, ELP batted first and Damani ruthlessly hit the first two balls for four, with Shah laying down another four in only the first over to score 14 runs.
ELP's batters continued to probe Wadia's field with and found the spaces with monster hits, although Wadia's fielders and bowlers gradually adjusted and managed to restrict the weaker hits to singles or zeros putting the batters on the back-foot.
With an average team run rate of around 2 by the third over, Damani then drove the ball for a massive six straight past the bowler, followed by another three zippy fours in the fourth over.
With 36 runs to his name tournament rules forced Damani to bow out at that point and he was replaced by ELP associate Niren Shethia at the crease with 54 runs at the beginning of the fifth over.
While Shah and Shethia continued to test the field and put up a few strong hits, the Wadia field restricted them to only another 12 runs, leaving the Wadia lawyers with a target of 67 to win.
Wadia's batters Amit Manubarwala and Sagar Divekar opened up undaunted for their side, with Manubarwala starting with a four and following up with a second later in the first over, followed by a dangerous high-ball that was just metres away from being caught out.
While Wadia's pair did not quite find the gaps in the defence they nevertheless made the most of nearly every hit and laid down consistent singles and doubles with the occasional boundary.
At the end of the second over Wadia was well on target with 23 runs and continued to make ELP's field run but still failing to really connect for the big hits by the end of the third to reach 28.
ELP at that point had the field locked down despite Wadia's batters keeping up the pressure. Wadia only unlocked the stalemate later in the fourth over with a huge six for Manubarwala chased up by a four that whipped straight past the ELP bowler.
Sealing ELP's fate by the end of the fourth was another six that Manubarwala smacked over the ropes, taking Wadia up to 56 with 12 balls to go, needing only 11 runs to win.
From then on steady batting and a boundary by Wadia took the team up to 65, with two more runs required to win by the end of the fifth over.
Divekar, as he had throughout the match, took up the challenge and hit a huge six past the field with five balls to spare to win the trophy against the ELP team, which had defeated them at the same finals last year.
ELP's Shah said: "For us it's really about the camaraderie we can get going. There are no other occasions for lawyers. Instead of competing for clients and billable hours we can compete for runs, which is a great change."
Tournament director Praveen Hansraj said: "Everyone was happy, sporting and played very well. There was no incident in two days we had played and everything went as expected."
Wadia batter Manubarwala picked up man of the match in the finals having retired after scoring 36 runs, while ELP's Damani won man of the series.
A total of 16 teams participated over last Saturday and Sunday (16 and 17 January) at the Mumbai Police Gymkhana, with Advani & Co, ALMT Legal, NDA and AZB & Partners playing in group A; A S Dayal & Co, Crawford Bayley, ELP, Talwar Thakore & Associates playing in group B; Desai & Diwanji, DSK Legal, Majmudar & Co, Kanga & Co in group C; and J Sagar Associates (JSA), Khaitan & Co, Wadia and Trilegal in group D.
ELP has organised the tournament for the past two years running and Wadia's win ends the firm's one-year winning streak.
CORRECTION: Apologies for several unintentional typos in the first published version, which we have now corrected.
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1. Wadia Ghandy's name is spelt wrongly as "Wadia Gandhy".
2. Sagar Divekar's name is spelt wrongly as "Sagar Divawakar".
3. In the final, ELP batted first.
4. The last six of the match was hit by Sagar Divekar and not Amit Manubarwala, as Amit had retired after scoring 36, which eventually got him the Man of the Match award in the Final.
The match is over da, Wadia has the cup and the glory. Forget about it. If there were to be disqualified they should have been in the first place. Whats the use now tell me.
Anyways, many congratulations to the winner and accolades to ELP for organising a fantastic tournamment which provides a great platform for the professionals to bond.
[Senior counsel won the exhibition match but I am not sure of the score. Anyone? -Kian]
Sameer Sah
Majmudar & Co.
It is really sad to see your comments which are in poor light. The least you guys could have done before putting your comments is to get your facts right. Being part of the Wadia Ghandy team let me clarify to everyone that wadia had before the start of the tournament, sought a clarification from ELP and were informed that 2 article clerks will be permitted to play. It was only before our 2nd league match, we were informed that no articles are permitted and thereafter from the 3rd match onwards as per the instructions of ELP no articles were part of the team (facts may be confirmed with ELP) including for the semis and finals. So never question wadia ghandy's integrity on and off the field and whoever was present at the ground would know that we played hard and in the right spirit and won fair and square. So be more careful with your comments especially if Wadia Ghandy is involved and as a lawyer please keep in mind the golden rule that is to always get your facts right.
Amit Manubarwala
Wadia Ghandy & Co
In addition to the post by Amit may I add that the match against JSA where 2 articles and not 3 were allowed to play and that too was done after consultation with, and after taking the permission of the JSA captain(I must commend his sportsman spirit) and ELP's tournament director. As there was a shortage of players at that point of time it was decided by JSA captain and the Organizers to allow the articles to play for that one match. That was the understanding on which the 2 articles played in that match. The rest of the matches were played without any single articles participating in the rest of the matches. Rest of the facts have been clarified in Amit's post hereinabove.
Further, the rules mandated that only and only 'qualified profesionals' representing the firm and not 'qualified lawyers' were allowed to participate so I think there is some mistake of facts there. If we were to get into the debate as to whether the said articles were 'qualified professionals' or not we can debate that at length. Lets not extend that in this forum.
We at Wadia Ghandy have always kept INTEGRITY over and above anything else, Hence its quite saddening when allegations baseless and false, such as these are made. Having said that we are not required to answer any queries nor clarify our positions to anyone. We won it fair and square and we dont require to clarify that to random 'cry-babies' crying foul in this forum.
SASWATA MITRA
WG & CO
Longgggg comments and using words like 'sour grapes' and 'crying babies' makes it very evident that somebody is trying to justify their so called 'INTEGRITY' and making it very apparent that rules were bypassed. Grow up guys. Enjoy your success dudes and dont justify your stands whatever it is or it was. It has brought you success and u should bask in its glory rather then answering / defending or claryfying, thats what a true champion is and you guys have just proved it otherwise.
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