I joined as trainee engineer in one of the software companies of pune. I can't mention its name because it's against its policy of taking its name anywhere. I joined this company in the month of November of year 2008. Within four months since then cricket tournament was held that is in the month of March. Actually, this kind of activity takes place every year. These kind of activities are common in IT companies. There are several other games that take place like Chess, football, Badminton. There are also competitions that take place between IT companies that is inter IT cricket tournament and so on. Coming back to my first cricket tournament, it kicked off on 24th March 2009. It should have been taken earlier but due to some unavoidable reasons, it got postponed and took in the summer season when at mid-day, it becomes irressistable to play or even walk when sun is hovering right above your head.

There is a special committee in the organization which takes charge of organizing these kind of activities. This committee consists of members which are employees of the same organization. Everyone is free to become member but vacancy needs to be there in that committee. Usually, fresh joinees and people with designation as software engineer participate. People at upper hierarchy cannot because of work load. Basically, this committee is lead by one of the Human Resource Department. So, a week before, notice about cricket tournament was rotated among all employees through mails, posting posters at appropriate locations within company.

Firstly, it was told that you have to make your own team as per choice but after giving thought that there would be no participation from upper level peoples like project managers. So, terms and conditions were changed and they were made like this that every project constitutes a team. If you have got less team members then you can colaborate with other project teams, who are facing the same. But, criteria is to have one project manager and one project lead compulsorily in a team. This compulsion made 6 teams to come out. Team names were based on names of IPL teams like vIndians, vChallengers, vChargers and so on. My team name was vIndians and was favorite for winning tournament as per comments by many employees.

First match kicked off at 7.30 AM in the morning and guess what, our team was having match against vChallengers first. We lost the toss and were made to bowl first. It was 10 overs each game. And without having any sort of practice, we stepped on ground. For me, it had been 8 months having played my last cricket match and that too in college. Surprisingly for me, i was asked to bowl very first over. As expected, i bowled first ball as beamer. Batsman got surprised and i apologised immediately. Then again i took my foot marking correctly and then started bowling from behind the stumps. That time, bowl was pitching appropriate at right places. And there went my first over costing 5 runs. It gave me much confidence as it wasn't expected by me to give only 5 runs, atleast for me. Then, i bowled my second over in which i took wicket of the same batsman to whom i bowled beamer earlier by bowling bouncer at his chest and it was caught and bowled wicket. As this wicket fell, there came noise from pavilion where other players and committee members were watching, " C'mon Abhishek!!!" It gave me moral boost and in my second over, i gave 8 runs and took a wicket. And score of opposition was 23/1 after 3 overs. Looking at my bowling figures, 2 overs 13 runs and a wicket, my team captain decided to finish off my spell straight away. There were 3 overs restrictions for 2 bowlers. My bowling figures were then 3 overs 27 runs 1 wicket.

There was chance of chipping another wicket, but fielder dropped the catch in my over. Then, later part, i played my part by taking two catches and making one run-out. Final score of opposition team was 69/6 after 10 overs. Then in second innings, our openers started scoring at such a fast rate as if we have to score 150 runs in 10 overs. Those two openers were sufficient to make team pass the score of opposition in 7th over. This show of batting gave little idea to other teams about how to bowl to us. Every other team tried a lot but could not stop us from reaching into finals but as finals were also on the same day and having played 3 matches prior to finals, our players were almost exhausted and asked to postpone finals on next weekend but failed to get it postponed. As a result, we lost the finals as our whole team set the target of just 52 runs in 10 overs for the opposition. Opposition team easily achieved this target but being lost the finals though, i enjoyed playing in this tournament and will never forget my first cricket tournament in my first ever software company in rest of my life !!!