AP Dutta Press Fighters & Budu’s Hailakandi enter semi final of BUKSS Media Cricket

February 7: Friday witnessed two very interesting matches in the BUKSS organised Jookto Cricket Match. In the first match, AP Dutta Press Fighters played against Ganashakti Panthers. The second match was between Budu’s Hailakandi Media Chargers and SML Karimganj Press.

Ganashakti Panthers won the toss and elected to field. The 3 top order batsman of AP Dutta Press Fighters scored good runs. Taher Ahmed hit 6 boundaries and scored 33 runs of 19 balls. Shyam Sinha, another opening batsman managed 25 runs out of 32 balls with 2 boundaries in his stride. Anirban Roy Choudhury maintaining his form of the previous day scored 34 in 20 balls before he was run out. Anirban was the highest run scorer of the match. The other batsmen could not credit much runs to their account. Ultimately, the Press Fighters scored 123 out of their 15 overs by losing 7 wickets.

Keeping in mind the winning target of 124 runs, opening batsmen of Ganashakti Panthers,  Abhijit Bhattacharjee and Pritam Das stepped on the field. Abhijit, however, failed to maintain his form of the previous day and was bowled by Biman at 7. Pritam Das was under pressure and restrained himself from taking risk. He managed 27 runs, the highest among the Panthers before he was bowled by Shyam. Binit Nath remained not out at 16. The other batsmen failed to create any impact.

Finally, at the end of 15 overs, the Ganashakti Panthers could manage only 77 runs at the loss of 8 wickets. Shyam Sinha bowled really well and claimed 3 wickets by conceding only 12 runs in his 3 overs.  AP Dutta Press Fighters had a easy victory over the Ganashakti Panthers by a margin of 46 runs.

The second match of the day was played between Budu’s Hailakandi Media Chargers and SML Karimganj Press. SML Karimganj won the toss and elected to bat. However, the opening batsman Jasim Uddin lost his wicket just after playing 6 balls. Abhijit appealed for leg before wicket and up went the umpire’s finger. Jasim scored only 4 runs. Another opening batsman, Nabendu scored 14 out of 14 balls before he gave up his wicket to Ashok. The highest scorer of SML Karimganj was Sajjad Khan. With one boundary and one six in his credit, Sajjad scored 17 runs out of 19 balls. It was a very low scoring match and their innings came to an end at only 77 runs at the loss of 8 wickets. Rahul Chakraborty picked up 3 wickets.

In return, Budu’s Hailakandi Media Chargers came to bat with an easy target of only 78 runs in 15 overs. Opening batsman Mondeep Malakar hit 7 boundaries and remained not out. It was infact, Mandeep who steered the Chargers to victory. In only 11.2 overs, they could easily manage 79 runs to make their place in the semi-finals.

The 2 semi-final matches of the BUKSS organised Jookto Cricket Match will be played at Silchar DSA on Saturday. The first semi-final will be played between Ganashakti Media Panthers and Friends of the Earth News Rockers at 9.30 AM. The second semi final match scheduled at 12.30 PM will witness fight between AP Dutta Press Fighters and Budu’s Hailakandi Media Chargers.

Also Read: Friends of the Earth & AP Dutta Press Fighters wins on Thursday in BUKSS cricket fest