Match Report: Saturday, March 20, 2021.
Qualifier 1 for PCCT Taiwan Premier League (PTPL) : PCCT vs FCC
Four games in total were played on the weekend. First being the Qualifier 1 played between PCCT and FCC on Saturday morning. The forecast for the day was sunny and clear of rain. FCC won the toss and elected to bat. Openers Rahul and Omesh started steadily and took the score to 50/0 in the power play of 6 overs. Rahul got out in the next over with team score on 52. Arun joined Omesh and FCC went to drinks break at 74/1 in 10 overs. Omesh had been playing a great knock till the break and got out first ball after the break trying to up the run rate. He was the top scorer for FCC with 44 runs in 33 balls (2x 4s, 4x 6s). Wickets kept falling at regular intervals after the break, first Pintu then Arun. Nitish came to crease at start of 13th over after fall of Pintu’s wicket and soon saw Anthony depart to a lose shot. Nitish tried to steady the ship and was the second highest scorer with 22 runs of 19 balls but didn’t get much help from other batsman as wickets kept tumbling. There were a couple terrible calls from the umpires which did not help FCC and their innings ended at 127/10 in 19.4 overs.
Chasing a modest total of 128, PCCT openers Amjad and Asif started strongly and reached a total of 46 in 5 overs. Captain Arun brought himself into the attack to stop the bleeding. He bowled a great sixth over and picked up two wickets in the over only giving away 2 runs. He came back to bowl a maiden in eight over and Sadique started the ninth over with a wicket and only gave 1 run. Arun and Sadique turned the game on its head with disciplined bowling, not giving much runs and picking up wickets at regular intervals. Tight bowling also led to two direct hit run outs, one each from Rahul and Himanshu. From 46/0 after 5 overs, PCCT was 64/6 at the end of 11 overs. Usman and Ansar tried to rebuild and had a good partnership of 36 runs in 30 balls before Usman got caught by Nitish off bowling of Siddhesh. This was the 7th wicket falling at score of 99 in 15.3 overs with PCCT still needing 29 runs to win. It was anyone’s game at this stage. Ansar took advantage of the short and wide bowls bowled by FCC bowlers and took PCCT home in 18.3 overs staying unbeaten on 34 runs in 23 balls. Two more decisions from the same umpire were terrible and would have gone against FCC but Amjad walked after not given caught behind. A great display of sportsmanship applauded by everyone on FCC team. FCC bowling was very loose in this game other than Arun (4-1-8-3) and Sadique (4-0-15-1).
With the virtue of this win, PCCT advanced straight to the finals and FCC would get one more chance against the winner of Daredevils vs Dragons.
Now FCC secured it’s place in play offs where top 4 teams will participate. Cheers to FCC and all the team! 
