Against an attack led by Varun Aaron, once regarded as one of the fastest bowlers in the country and veteran left-arm spinner Shahbaz Nadeem, this lad smashed 12 sixes and 17 fours on his way to breaking South African Alan Barrow’s record of being the youngest to notch up a double ton in List A cricket... .. .. ~ and today he made a ton !
Many a
times, the draw could be lop-sided.For
today’s Semifinal clash at Potchefstroom between India Pakistan, the teams had
different hardship routes.India beat
Srilanka by 90 runs; beat Japan by 10 wicekts, beat New Zealand by 44 runs and
beat Australia by 74 runs.All big wins
– against 3 strong teams.However for
Pakistan, it was all easy. First they beat Scotland by 7 wickets, beat Zimbabwe
by 38 runs, the match against Bangladesh was washed out, beat Afganisthan by 6
wickets – literally not one strong team.
Potchefstroom
is an academic city in the North West Province of South Africa. It is situated on the banks of the Mooi river (Afrikaans
for "pretty (or beautiful) river"), roughly 120 km (75 mi)
west-southwest of Johannesburg.The
town, founded in 1838 by the Voortrekkers, is the second oldest settlement of
people of European descent in the then Transvaal.In October 1840, it was decided that
Potchefstroom would unite with "Pieter Mouriets Burg" (Pietermaritzburg) ~ does that name sound something to you ?
A few
decades ago, Ashok Mankad would bring in unknown players for Mafatlal / Nirlons
and would win Buchibabu tournament by sheer batting performance.Mumbai has always produced classy batsman –
Vijay Manjrekar, Vijay Merchant, Chandu Borde, Ashok Mankad, Dilip Sardesai,
Ajit Wadekar, Salim Durrani, Ramnath Parkar, Sunil Gavaskar, Farokh Engineer, Eknath
Solkar,Dilip Vengsarkar, Sandeep Patil,
Ravi Shastri, Sanjay Manjrekar, Praveen Amre, Amol Majumdar, Sachin Tendulkar,
Vinod Kambli, Wasim Jaffer, Rohit Sharma, Ajinkya Rahane, Prithvi Shaw … and … more … and the latest sensation in
that list could well be ‘ Yashasvi Bhupendra Kumar Jaiswal’. ~ he is in news today.
I had written at
length about him a few months back.Vijay
Hazare Trophy, the Ranji One-Day Trophy, that was started in 2002–03 as a
limited-overs cricket domestic competition involving state teams from the Ranji
Trophy plates is now on. It is named after the famous Indian cricketer Vijay
Hazare.Tamil Nadu is the most successful
team having won the trophy 5 times. 17
year oldYashasvi Jaiswal became the
youngest man to hit a List A double-century, finishing with finishing with 203
in 154 balls against Jharkhand in the Vijay Hazare Trophy. The Mumbai opener was the
second to double up this season after Sanju Samson made history a week earlier ,
scoring 212 not out. Karn Veer Kaushal's had scored 202 for Uttarakhand against Sikkim last season. Of the nine double-tons in List A cricket by
Indian batsmen, five have come in ODIs: three by Rohit Sharma, and one each by
Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag. Those aside,Shikhar Dhawan made 248 for India A against
South Africa A in Pretoria in 2013.
Opening the batting
against Jharkhand in Alur with Aditya Tare, Jaiswal outscored his more
experienced partner as the two put on 200 runs for the first wicket in 34.3
overs.Jaiswal first came in the spotlight during the
Under-19 Asia Cup in Dhaka in October last year, when he scored a 113-ball 85
in the final as India beat Sri Lanka by 144 runs. His achievement is all the
more laudable given the face of adversity ! ~ media reports suggest that his
background is very poor and he struggled a lot in his life.
Today in the 1st
Semifinals of U19 Cricket Worldcup, Pakistan, who opted to bat, seemed on
course for a respectable total as their opener Haider Ali and captain Rohail
Nazir put on a half-century stand for the third wicket. The duo helped Pakistan
recover from 34 for 2 in the ninth over, but Haider fell soon after reaching
his fifty while trying to cut part-timer Jaiswal. India's two quicks Sushant Mishra and Kartik
Tyagi did most of the damage - sharing five wickets between them - while
legspinner Ravi Bishnoi finished with two from his 10 overs.
Having been deflated
with a collapse of 6 for 26, Pakistan Under-19 could pose no challenge to the
India Under-19 opening pair of Yashasvi Jaiswal and Divyaansh Saxena, who shared
an unbeaten stand of 176. Jaiswal reached his first hundred in the tournament
with a six to seal India's win while Saxena remained unbeaten on 59. The score
card reads : India Under-19 176 for 0 (Jaiswal 105*, Saxena 59*) beat Pakistan
Under-19 172 (Nazir 62, Haider 56, Mishra 3-28, Tyagi 2-32, Bishnoi 2-46) by 10
wickets with almost 15 overs to spare and enter the finals for the 3rd
straight time.
Now if you
remember that Q at the start on –Pietermaritzburg- : it is the capital and second
largest city in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. It was founded in 1838 – its
purist Zulu name is umGungundlovu. This is popularly translated from the Zulu
as "Place of the Elephant", although it could also be translated to
mean "The elephant wins". Pietermaritzburg is to be remembered for the incident that
occurred early in the life of Mahatma Gandhi. On 7 June 1893, while Gandhi was
on his way to Pretoria, a white man objected to Gandhi's presence in a
first-class carriage, and he was ordered to move to the van compartment at the
end of the train. Gandhi, who had a first-class ticket, refused, and was thrown
of the train at Pietermaritzburg. Shivering through the winter night in the
waiting room of the station, Gandhi made the momentous decision to stay on in
South Africa and fight the racial discrimination against Indians there.
With regards
– S. Sampathkumar
4th
Feb 2020.
