In spite of light rain the game started on time and upon winning the toss, Wesleyan elected to bat first. A bowler-friendly pitch and wet conditions had the home team in trouble with the top five batsmen back in the pavilion before the score had reached 30. From then on, Chemistry graduate student Haribabu Arthanari (24 runs scored off 42 balls faced), ably supported by Ashvin Chadha’02 (8 off 13), Jugjeev Duggal’01 (16 off 9) and Vuyani Sifiniza (13 off 31) helped Wesleyan to a fighting total of 119 runs in 22 overs, 3 overs short of the 25 overs limit (one over consists of 6 balls). The final score included 51 extras (wides and no-balls), thanks to some wayward bowling by Middlebury.

Middlebury’s reply got off to a slow start with graduate students Swarna Basu and Sanjai Kumar bowling accurate first spells. An early wicket by Swarna (final tally: 3 wickets for 8 runs conceded), followed by two wickets in 4 balls by Vuyani (2 for 22) and another one by Jugjeev (1 for 22) reduced the visitors to 19 runs for 5 wickets. There was also a run-out resulting from an excellent pick-up and throw by Vuyani and wicket-keeper Jacob Fain’02 knocked the stumps down with the batsman way off the mark. Accurate bowling by Wesleyan, backed up by brilliant fielding and wicketkeeping restricted Middlebury to a total of 79 runs, off 22 overs. Zaki Choudhury’02 took a brilliant catch, diving full-length forward and Ashvin (1 for 10) finished off the match with the final wicket. Sanjai (1 for 13) dismissed their best batsman who had contributed 32 runs to their total. Also playing for Wesleyan were Arnab Bhattasali’03, and graduate students Michael Huber (MB&B) and S. Ranganathan (CHEM). Rajesh Nagarajan of the Chemistry Department fielded for some time as the reserve player.