Cricket anyone??

For those of you who check the blog site regularly for new photos may be wondering about the pictures from India.  Our new Managing Director for India is big on team building and there is no better way to do that than through sports so he organized a monthly Cricket Match for the entire factory.  The second test match happened to fall on the same weekend that I was there so I got to participate in a 10 over match.  We divided up into three teams and I got to draw for which team got the first round bye and as luck would have it I drew our team.  As a result we were automatically in the final round and had a chance to scope out the other teams.  The field we played on was an open clearing near the factory and actually had a road that ran through the middle of it that was used by farmers, bikers, motorcycles and the occasional water buffalo.  We even had two cows and a water buffalo as mascots throughout the match as their owner was grazing them on the field and he decided to hang around and watch the match.

The game of cricket is similar (sort of) to baseball in that there is a bowler (pitcher) a batsman (batter), runs, hits, outs and fielders.  That pretty much sums up the similarities.  From there it deviates quite a bit.  An over is 6 balls bowled.  The bowler's objective is to hit the stumps (wickets) that the batsman is trying to protect.  If the stumps are hit it is called a wicket and the batsman is out. If the batter hits the ball (in any direction) he may choose to run from one set of stumps to the other which scores a run for each "lap" between the stumps.  The fielders then field the ball and throw it to the catcher who tries to hit the stumps before the batsman reaches the safety of the batter's box. If the ball is hit and goes outside the circular boundary on the ground it is an automatic 4 runs, if the ball goes outside the same boundary but in the air it is a "homerun" and counts for 6 runs.  If a fielder catches a batted ball in the air - the batter is out.  Each side bats for 10 overs (60 balls bowled - not counting "wide bowls" and "no bowls") consecutively or until they get 10 outs. 
We played the winning team of the first game and won 68 to 63 in 9 and 2/3rds overs.  Our final batsman won "man of the match" by hitting two "fours" and a homerun to seal the win.  All in all it was a very fun afternoon in the mid seventies with plenty of sun.  I came back to Shanghai with quite a case of sunburn but it was well worth it to experience India's national past time.