10 teams including four foreign teams from Singapore, Malaysia & India participated in the 21st edition of the Jakarta International Sixes cricket tournament, a fast, action-packed format which celebrates the pleasures of boundary hitting.
Raju CC from Hyderabad, India comfortably won the trophy on their debut, defeating a strong Selular Lions team from Singapore, in the finals, played at the picturesque Cibubur Cricket ground. In the high-scoring finals, the Player of Tournament, Surya Narayanan had got the Lions off to a brisk start and with support from Surender Chandramohan, was steering his team to a huge score. The Raju captain, Neeraj Bisht pulled things back with a good final over and Selular Lions ended up with 66 runs in their 5 overs which looked competitive. Taran Singh & Neeraj Bisht kicked off the Raju CC reply in a frantic fashion, belting huge sixes almost at will and they needed just 4 overs to overhaul the target and take their team home.
Earlier, Selular Lions had beaten a spirited Maung Jabar side in the semi-finals. The Maung Jabar side, comprised of Indonesian players from Jawa Barat was the revelation of the tournament. They advanced to the semi-finals after beating some very strong sides and their only loss was to the eventual winners Raju CC. Ceylon CC also had a wonderful tournament, making it to semi-finals with big contributions from Vimal Nair, Dihan Silva & Karthigai Deepan.
The Maung Jabar opening batsman & the rising Indonesian star, Ahmad Ramdoni had a brilliant tournament as he topped the runs tally with 184 runs in just 7 games, thus earning the Best Batsman of the Tournament trophy. Mohibullah Hussaini, also from Maung Jabar, was awarded the Best Bowler trophy for taking the highest number of wickets and at a fantastic economy rate.
Surya Narayanan from Selular Lions won the Best Player of the tournament trophy on the back of his strong all-round performance and for providing the needed impact for his side in crucial games. The big Taran Singh, from Raju CC was the awarded the Most 6s trophy for hitting 16 sixes, with many of them being close to 80 metre hits.
The Plate was won by Asiatic Smashers, on the back a very good & consistent performance by Govind Sodani, who relishes the Sixes format. The Smashers defeated Penang CC in the Plate finals.
The Sixes format is great to way enjoy the fun-side of cricket & we were delighted to host so many wonderful foreign teams, this year, said S. Gopalakrishnan, the Tournament coordinator.
Iam sure, the young Indonesians would have benefited a lot from the experience of playing against & watching so many senior cricketers from India & Singapore, said Avakash Lohia, the President of JCA.
