Oxford Cambridge Day

Sports is fun. And more so, when it is between arch rivals like India-Pakistan. Yesterday, it was Oxford-Cambridge. A day that began with a variety of sports and ended with music n masti.

Squash, soccer, touch-rugby, cricket, badminton, rowing. Oxford came on top except the last one. The domination continues and tradition lives for another year.

The weather was perfect for outdoor activities. We guys were looking forward to a win against Cambridge after our loss to St. Hughes couple of days ago. More so, as it would act as a good confidence booster ahead of our next Oxford inter-college match next week.

We lost the toss and Cambridge invited us to bat. What followed was absolute mockery of the new ball/old ball attack :) Murtaza, our star opener, punched boundary after boundary. As runs continued to flow from his blade, the team ended the innings at a very healthy 240 (20 overs) - Murtaza's contribution: 149 runs. Exhilarating.

It would always have been a difficult chase barring some outstanding performance from the opposition. And Adi took 2 wickets in his second over which forced them on the backfoot. We kept on maintaining the pressure right through and bowled them out in 12 overs for some 60 runs. It was absolute demolition. Some call it Murtaza v/s Cambridge - No doubt. My contribution - 2 catches, imp because catches win matches. Pics below.

Murtaza and Anuj - Openers going in

Murtaza in action

The brigade cheering the openers

Oxford XI

(Sitting: L-R) Rahul, myself, Chris, Anuj, Kartik

Standing (L-R) Satya, Andrew, Rushabh, Sumit, Murtaza, Adi

Another Team Pic

Red Cherry

Oxford and Cambridge XI

After the match

Cambridge guys in whites and light blues

Winners take it all

More pics - Enjoy!

Coming out of the Examination Hall - Hillary Term (Last Exam)

With Chris at the Oxford Castle (For the OM project)

Sunil and Satya - On way to Oxford History Museuem

At the Oxford Castle - Kids on a Tour

From Top of the Oxford Castle

Entrance of the Oxford Castle

With Deepak, Archit - At Andrea's bday party

Romain and his toylike kid

It was just too good

Archit, Xing, Angel (Anti-clockwise)

Archit, Esther

The party was at Templeton common room

With Saif - At the London eye

View from the bridge

In deep sleep

Another shot

Big Ben

Oxford Inter College Cricket League - I Match vs St. Hughes

The team had a good day's workout, though the result wasn't in our favor.

Fielding first, we restricted St. Hughes to 124 runs in about 33 overs (40 over a side match). The bowling was pretty good and considering it was the first match of season, it was a very good effort. Kartik was on-the spot most of the times and rocked the opposition's middle order with four wickets. Aditya, Shariq and Andrew all played good supporting roles.

We started the chase cautiously - myself and Ruz were told to stay out in the middle for as long as we could and blunt the new ball attack. It was cold out there with a strong wind blowing across. The bowling was seasoned and the opening bowlers gave very little away. The new ball was doing a little bit at the start and with the bounce they extracted from the pitch, it was difficult to play your shots - though we did manage a couple of boundaries between us; a delicate fine leg glance by myself and a super cover drive by Ruz. I was the first to get out (excellent catch by the bowler on his followthrough) with the score on 22 (7overs). Then, we lost a flurry of wickets and we were 5 down for just 40 runs. Kartik and Adi built up a small little partnership but once Kartik got out, it was all over for us. In the end, we managed to score 84. Not a good effort, more so if I tell you that we suffered 3 run outs! Add to that 3 super catches they took - their fielding was awesome.

The next match is with Cambridge day after tomorrow and the team is all geared up to win that match - we missed couple of our key players today, Rahul and Murtaza will boost our team on Saturday. We should win that one - I will keep you posted.

After Long

Hillary has ended and Trinity has begun - and I have remained as lazy as I could be. Life's moving on (don't know at rapid or slow pace) - another few months and I will be an Oxford graduate for the outside world. A quick snapshot of what happened last term:
1. Dean's dinner - fantastic evening with very good food
2. Marketing assignment - Hit with a 50, still can't figure out why!
3. EP EP EP - during the last few weeks and the term break
4. Jobs Jobs Jobs - some guys have succeeded; Tech Mahindra stole the show for some reasons - few desis already placed which is very good for them. Went to Cambridge as well.
5. Templeton dinners - 2 in number; again, good food and wine
6. Exams - FinMan was the show stopper; tough exam first up in the week, rest were cake walk but I pray I pass in Marketing
7. Vacation - Met Capri, Rubal didi/jiju/kiddos - had a good time; good Indian food

Some pics from the Cambridge trip

Cambridge River

Like any other Oxford College

With Fernando in Judge Lecture Theatre

Oxford Gang outside Cambridge B-school