BRITISH OFFICERS CC – CHICAGO UNITED DEEPEN HISTORY
The British Officers Cricket Club (BOCC) appears in cricket history back in the ‘Golden Age’ of cricket in Philadelphia in the late 1800’s. However, as an affiliate of The British Officers Club of Philadelphia founded in 1925, regular games were played until WWII. The BOCC was re-born in 1986 and has been very active since. Recently BOCC hosted Chicago United (CU) at their home ground located at Evansburg State Park in Collegeville, PA. On this historic tour, Chicago United won the toss and elected to bat against BOCC on a cloudy Saturday morning. Anirudh and Venkatesh Naidu opened the batting for CU and got off to a quick start. Anirudh played some beautiful shots for boundaries over the covers and a six straight down the ground before he got out to Kunal. Sachin Veerasammy went into bat at no. 3 and started his innings steadily. With 3 down for 90 at the end of 12 over, Roopan played a stellar knock in his debut game along with Sachin who got the BOCC bowlers clueless with his characteristic lofts, punches and pulls stitching an assured partnership of 62 runs. Sachin got out after scoring a quick fire 68 of 49 balls meanwhile Roopan scored a steady 50 and got out on 69 of 58 balls. CU finished with 277 runs in 37.1 over with Nitish Kadam being the star bowler for the BOCC who picked 5 wickets for 44 runs. BOCC opened their batting with Arun Kumar and Shariq Khan. Neil Shah who opened the bowling for CU did not let the BOCC batsman to settle as he got both the openers out in his first two overs. BOCC skipper Charles Mathew played a lone hand to score 42 of 33 balls as the other BOCC batsmen failed to give a stand. Hammad was the pick of bowlers for CU with 7-1-29-3. Sumukha Prasanna, Nadeem Williams and Neil Shah picked 2 wickets each. The CU bowlers were right on the money as they got BOCC all out for 129 in 32.3 over. Brief Scores: CU : 277 all out in 37.1 overs ( Roopan Manivel 69, Sachin Veerasammy 68, Nithish Kadam 5/44) BOCC: 129 all out in 32.3 overs (Charles Mathew 42, Hammad 3/29 Neil Shah 2/14, Sumukha 2/14, Nadeem W 2/17)
