The Optimist's 2nd XI traveled to Hasselt on 28th July for their 3rd game of the league. After having lost their first match, the team had won the 2nd game and the team was eager to maintain the momentum.
Optimists lost the toss and were put to bat first by the home team. Praveen and Vijay opened the batting and looked solid from the first delivery. Relatively shorter boundaries and quick outfield meant that the batsmen were able to get the maximum return for their shots. The uneven outfield added to the miseries of the fielding side. Vijay played his natural attacking style and optimists reached 50 runs in the 6th Over. Vijay was dismissed in the 8th over for a quick fire 43 of 29 deliveries. Richard Grundy joined Praveen in the middle and both kept scoring at a brisk pace. Praveen was dismissed for 48 in the 18th over with the score at 118. Girish went in at no. 4 and along with Richard kept the momentum going without losing any wicket till the 30th over. Richard got out in the 31st over trying to accelerate the scoring. At 193 for 3 at the end of the 31st over, Optimists werenow in a great position to post a big total, with wickets in hand and their captain in great form. Pankaj joined Girish, and both of them accelerated scoring with Girish scoring boundaries at will. Girish got to his century in the 40th over. Girish was dismissed for 104 in 74 deliveries. Rest of the batsman pitched in to take the team score to 308 for 8 in 45 overs. Vice captain Mohit got out cheaply and was determined to prove his worth.
Optimists opened the bowling with Pankaj and Mohit. Both the opening bowlers were consistently beating the bat and kept the lid on the scoring rate. Pankaj struck first in the 4th over of the innings. What followed next was a devasting spell of swing bowling by Mohit. Mohit struck thrice in the 5th over (a Hatriccccccccckkkk) and once in the 7th over. The most remarkable aspect was that 3 of those 4 tickets were bowled. Brussels Greens all of a sudden slipped from 21 for 1 to 27 for 5. There was no recovery from that stage. The fielding and the energy was top notch on a difficult outfield. Richard Grundy threw himself around and nothing could get past him on the offside. Eventually, Brussels Greens were all out for 96. Mohit ended up with figures of 6 for 28 . He was supported by Vishy (2 wickets) , Pankaj and Anshuman (1 wicket each).
Optimists CC won by a big margin of 212 runs. The campaign is back on track.
The next game is away at Antwerp, who will be ready for a revenge after having lost the first game to us.