Alum Bati reports on cricket's first excursion to Quba:

The weather may have been very British but the location was entirely different ñ Quba, the agricultural heart of upper Azerbaijan. Cricket made its journey north from Baku and treated Quba to the sight of a motley crew of 22 dressed in white, plus two even more strangely-attired gentlemen wearing broad-brimmed hats, the umpires, Sean Halliday and Lutful Kabir.

Photo © ECC

The heavy morning rain almost put an end to an exciting first excursion for the Baku Cricket Club but, after the rugby players had well and truly churned up the ground, the cricket ñ an India XI v. a Rest of the World XI - got under way an hour late.

The Rest of the World, captained by British ambassador, Andrew Tucker, chose to bat. The opening pair, John Connor and Arif Hashmi, looked comfortable against some good bowling from Sachin Hardikar (2 wickets for 5 runs) and Akhilesh Sukumaran (3 for 12 and unlucky not to achieve a hat-trick). But the uneven bounce undid more than one player and John Connor was first to go to a skyward shot. There were 7 runs on the scoreboard as Talegh Bagiyev, one of four Azeris in the side, came to the wicket. Talegh played one good shot only to be clean bowled by Akhilesh. Then, the rest of the team seemed to join the Magic Circle ñ now you see them, now you don't.

Photo © ECC

Umar Yusuf could at least be forgiven ñ he took a brutal blow in the face and got a broken nose for his pains. Faisal Ishaq (16) and Jeyhun Novruzov (8), the star of the Azeri contingent, steadied proceedings for a while, putting on 32 for the sixth wicket. But the total of 59 always looked too low.

And so it proved to be. The Indian batsmen, led once again by the relentless Rajesh Chowla, knocked off the runs as if they were eager to return to Baku as soon as possible. It took 7 overs of blistering attack to reach the target for the loss of only two wickets, with Chetan Bapna, taking a liking to the bowling of Sean Barry, unbeaten on 42 and Akhilesh on 6.

For more details of cricket in Baku, contact Alum Bati on abati@salans.com.