Over to some cricket for Television stars...

It seems TV actors have found a new way to pass time during the days of strike, i.e. to play cricket and that too for a cause. Hence many of them turned up on November 8th at the Andheri Sports Complex for ITA( Indian Televsion Academy) 20/20 charity cricket match for Beti, the girl child. In fact this is the 3rd match organized by ITA for a social cause.

The actors were divided into teams i.e. Television Warriors ( Blue ) and Television Tigers(Yellow) with Sharad Kelkar and Varun Badola leading their teams respectively. 

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The other prominent players in Blue jerseys were  Shaan, Karan Mehra, Karan Wahi, Rajeev Thakur, Siddharth Shukla and Jay Bhanushali, while the Yellow squad included Mohit Malik, Sachin Sharma, Gaurav Chopra and Manoje Bidwai among others.

The Warriors won the match quite easily chasing the required 150 in just 18.3 overs. Earlier the  Tigers managed to post  150/9  in their stipulated 20 overs. 

Varun blamed the defeat on the unfair composition of the teams. “We did not have a balanced side while the opposition had many all-rounders. But even then we did put up a decent score”, says he. Sachin Sharma who got run out blamed it on a misunderstanding with his skipper. “We didn't have a chat before the match which led to this communication gap. Even though I dived to get back to the crease I felt short and was run out”, quips Sachin.

The star, though in the winning team was Man of the Match, Rajeev Thakur who made an unbeaten 39 in just 26 deliveries. He was ably helped by Karan Mehra who also added 36 runs with one big hit to the fence.  Karan felt “that the target was always quite achievable, but we did mess it up a bit by losing 6 wickets”.

The Tiger innings had began quite badly, as they lost 4 wickets quickly before the captain Varun Badola and Manoje steadied the innings. Varun chipped in with 39 valuable runs while Manoj top scored with 46 with one 6.

In a bid to spice up the day, Shaan,and Sachin Sharma  also doubled as commentators and were miming actors.

In an age of gender equality, if boys can play so well, why should the girls stay away, right? In keeping with this spirit, a 2 overs girl's match was also played between television Glam Dolls(Yellow) and Youngistan(Blue). Some of the well known faces in the Yellow team were Barkha Bisht, Bharkha Madan and Amrita Prakash. The Blue bridge consisted of Jasveer Kaur, Rinku Ghosh, Anu Ranjan and Priya Wall. 

The former could only make 15 runs which the latter easily achieved.

Rinku Ghosh who was the wicket keeper of Blue team says, “It was interesting, especially given that I don't know the "K" of cricket. But even then, I affected a wicket”, she says proudly. 

Priya Wall says, “It was quite funny, for the girls were bowling quite badly with the ball taking 4/5 bounces before reaching the bat. However Varun says it's okay for “If we take our cricket seriously, it does mean that others should also”.

Reporter and Author: Anil Merani