BOSTON–Lagaan Lions won the 2020 Champions Cup T20 Cricket tournament that was held over the Labor Day weekend in Boston.
It was a beautiful day playoffs and finals day on Labor Day with excellent weather for Cricket in the 80s. There were 8 teams from across New England region participating in the tournament divided into two pools A and B.
Drawn through lots Pool A included Waltham Tigers, Champions XI, Crowned Eagles and Lagaan Tigers. Pool B included Juggernauts, Bangladesh Sports Club, Khyber Zalmi and Lagaan Lions.
All local based teams from in and around Boston area participated and competed in the prize money $4,000 tournament which was sponsored by Helping Hand USA, Customers Bank and Venus Capital. Top 2 Teams from each pool qualified for Semis after the League phase. Pool A topper was Waltham Tigers and Pool A runners up was Crowned Eagles. Pool B topper was Juggernauts and Pool B runners up was Lagaan Lions.
Semi Final 1 – Waltham Tigers scored 201/ 7 in 20 overs and Lagaan Lions 204/5 chased the score in 18 overs. Lagaan Lions beat Waltham Tigers by 5 Wkts with Kevin Bhagat scoring 110 of 56 balls(9x4s, 7x6s) the 1st 100 of Tournament for Waltham Tigers and Raghavendra Kulaspur picked up 2 Wkts for Lagaan Lions. Lagaan Lions replied back with a swashbuckling 87 of 51 balls (6x4s, 7x6s) from Man of the Match Zeshan Muhammad and Saroosh Nadeem supporting him with 41 in 31 balls(6x4s). Chasing the score with 204/ 5 in 18 Overs. Gaurang Patel picked 2 Wkts for Waltham Tigers.
Semi Final 2 – Juggernauts beat Crowned Eagles by 9 Wkts. Sharaz Baksh Top scoring with 35 of 35 balls (4x4s) and Anil Yedugani 34 of 33 balls(2x4s, 1×6)for Crowned Eagles scoring 136 in 20 overs. The Juggernauts replied by chasing the total of 137/1 in 12 overs with an all round Man of the Match performance by a Fazal Alam picking up 2Wkts in bowling and scoring 85 of 36 balls (4x4s, 10x6s) with Paminder Singh scoring 29 of 19 balls (2x4s, 2x6s) opening the batting for Juggernauts.
Finals – Juggernauts versus Lagaan Lions was meant to be a Cracker of a Final with big hitting batsmen on both sides. Juggernauts included many New England stars of the Minor League Cricket like Fazal Alam, Pratik Dudhane (C), Raghunandan Sridhar, Ravi Singh, along with Lakhram Sanichar, Parak Anantha, Abhilash Eppa, Keerthi Maddy, Adil Sardar, Veda Vyas and Parminder Singh. While Lagaan Lions included Zeshan Muhammad, Raghavendra Kulaspur from Minor League along with Waqas Nawaz, Muqudas Raza, Saroosh Nadeem, Sandeep Chiniwar (C), Raghu Gadiraju, Abdul Samad, Varun Aiyanna, Nikhil Lavana and Joe Buffong.
Lagaan Lions Captain Sandeep Chiniwar won the toss chose to bat first with the team putting up 202 for 4 in 20 overs with contributions from Zeshan Muhammad 44(4x4s,4x6s),Saroosh Nadeem 50 NotOut(4x4s), Waqas Nawaz 48(2x6s, 4x4s) Raza 29(2x6s). Waqas and Saroosh Nadeem had 90 runs Partnership. Meanwhile chasing that huge score of 202, Juggernauts ended up with 191 for 7 in 20 Overs. Fazal Alam and Parminder Singh started off well before Fazal got out quickly followed by Pratik and Raghu with Juggernauts in a bit of bother at 75/3. Soon Parminder and Abhilash were going great with partnership of 77 and Parminder Singh top scoring with 85 (7x4s, 4×6) Abhilash Eppa 53 (2x4s, 4x6s). They fell short to reach the final score. Ragha Kulaspur got crucial 3 Wkts and bowled the final over defending 18 runs in T20. Saroosh with all round performance of 2Wkts and 50 NotOut for Lagaan Lions earned him Man of the Match for the Final Championship game.
More results: Best Batsman – Zeshan Muhammad (Lagaan Lions) 236 Runs for tournament; Best Bowler – Raghunandan Sridhar (Juggernauts) 11 Wkts for tournament
Umpires were Tony Best and Jatin Karvir.
It was all in all a great tournament for the Cricket crazy players and fans for the Labor Day weekend during a tough pandemic year 2020. All the Teams and Players who participated in the tournament were really happy with the tournament and the organizing committee of Lagaan Cricket Club. All precautions like temperature check, sanitizers, mask and social distancing etc were followed to have a successful tournament.
The tournament was hosted by Lagaan Cricket Club.
