Captain Sukhjit Singh takes a blow to the face as Warriors A edge Team B by 7 runs

An Aman Grover Trophy derby at Parc Sorbonne. Warriors A against Warriors A, in effect, since Team B is drawn from the same club.

Team B won the toss and chose to field, and captain Sukhjit Singh answered with the bat before he ever picked up the ball. Opening alongside Ahmed Reza, he went after the bowling from the start, lofting Maruthi Govindappa for six over deep mid-wicket, then hitting Amit Malhotra for four the same way. He fell for 43 off just 28 balls, bowled by Subodh Mahajan, but not before he and Reza had put on 71 for the first wicket.

71 for 1.

Reza should not have still been there to see it. Early in the innings, with Amit Malhotra bowling, Ranjeet Singh dropped a chance that would have ended his innings before it properly started. Reza cashed in the life. He punished Amit Malhotra for a six and a four later in that same spell, ground his way past fifty balls, and finally departed for exactly 30, bowled by Amit Malhotra himself in the 13th over. The bowler who'd been denied the wicket once got there in the end.

The rest of the innings went the way these things do once the platform is gone. Amit Kumar made a brisk 32 off 21 before he was caught at cow corner by Rohit Sharma off Aman Joshi. From there the wickets came in a cluster: Samba Siva Tiyyagura and Maninder Singh both fell to Raja Sukhdeo, Jagdeep Chuttani was stumped, and Rizwan Shaikh went caught at deep mid-wicket off Aman Joshi, who finished with three wickets. Warriors A closed on 164 for 8.

That total had help it didn't deserve. At least three boundaries off Amit Malhotra's bowling, spread across different batters, came from fumbles in the field rather than clean hitting. Those extra runs cost the team dearly in a game that finished on a margin of seven.

Team B's reply started well. Openers Amit Malhotra and Harry Sukhdeo took the score to 71 without alarm before Amit Malhotra, the bowler turned batter, was bowled by Maninder Singh for 25. Harry Sukhdeo kept going, cutting anything short to deep point and lofting sixes down the ground, and reached a well-made 49 off 56 balls before he was stumped by Sameer Malhotra off Samba Siva Tiyyagura. Aman Joshi went cheaply, bowled by Jagdeep Chuttani for 8, and Subodh Mahajan settled in to graft his way to 13.

Sukhjit Singh came on to bowl himself and was launched for six over cow corner by Rohit Sharma, his only over of the day. In the field, going up for a high chance, the ball caught him flush in the face and split his lip and tooth. He didn't bowl again, and Warriors A finished the job with the bowlers they had left.

They very nearly didn't. Rohit Sharma played an innings that threatened to take the game away from them completely: 34 off just 18 balls, finding the rope four times, before Jagdeep Chuttani had him bowled with the score on 150 for 5. That left Team B needing 15 from the last two overs with only the tail to do it. Raja Sukhdeo and Maruthi Govindappa fought hard for it but could find only seven more. Team B finished on 157 for 5.

Seven runs. That's the whole margin between a Warriors A win and a different result: a missed chance early on, three fumbled boundaries, and a captain who took a real blow to the face and still saw his side home. Amit Kumar took the player-of-the-match award, but this was a game that will be remembered for what almost happened as much as for what did.