Veteran Thakur picks five for Western Railway

MUMBAI: In today's cricket when fitness has become the key to success, it is not easy for a 39-year-old pacer to continue playing at competitive level. So Rahul Thakur, a chief ticket collector with the Western Railway, had given up playing in favour of young blood since last year. But when his team's regular opening bowler Vijay Gadwi was unfit to play in their Times Shield 'A' Division Group 'B' clash against DY Patil 'B', Thakur had to step in.
It turned out to be a good decision as Thakur returned with a figures of 5/61 and helped Western Railway 'A' restrict Patil 'B' for 408 in their first innings at their ground near Mahalaxmi.Western Railway, however, could only muster 221in their first innings reply and were 16 without loss following on.
"I have had my days and wanted to give youngsters a chance. That's why I had stopped playing but when team wanted my help, I had no option," says the man who played for Mumbai (2003-4 and 2004-5) and shared new ball with the likes of Ajit Agarkar and Munaf Patel. He later played Ranji for Railways (2005-6, 6-7 and 7-8).
How does he keeps fit to play in these days of heightened fitness regime in all forms of cricket? "I regularly bowl in the nets apart from regular stretching etc," says Thakur. "But ultimately I am as passionate as ever for the sport and always enjoy playing it because whatever I have achieved in life so far all thanks to cricket," says the man for whom it was his carrer's 32nd five-wicket haul for W Railways.
Brief scores:
'A' Group: Indian Oil SC 283/7 in 73 overs (Ankush Bains 64, Ravikant Shukla 56, Ashay Sardesai 58*; Sagar Trivedi 5-75) vs Air India SC. DY Patil Group 'A' 635/8 in 125.2 decl. (Shubham Ranjane 218* (195b, 21x4, 3x6), Rahul Lad 187 (264b, 4x19, 6x1), Swapnil Singh 53; Sanket Bhaye 3/107) vs C Rly SA 109/3 in 34 (Nikhil Paradkar 30*).
'B' Group: Tata SC 193 in 58.2 & 103/7 in 31 (Nikhil Patil* 32; Abhishek Nayar 3/13, Tushar Deshpande 3/44) vs BPCL 260 in 54.3 (Suryakumar Yadav 62, Abhishek Nayar 63, Bhavin Thakkar 41; Siddharth Raut 3/52, Omer Nazir 3/51). DY Patil Group 'B' 408 in 89.5 (Siddharth Chitnis 55; Hardik Rathod 4/81, Rahul Thakur 5/61) vs W Rly S.A. 'A' 221in 55.2 (Tushar Kadu 55, Ahad Malek 60, Sagar Mishra 30; Karsh Kothari 3/55, Pravin Tambe 4/50) & 16/0 in 10.
Vivekanand in semifinal
Swami Vivekanand Int., Rizvi Springfield, Don Bosco and VN Sule Guruji have made it to the semifinals of the MSSA Giles Shield (Elite Division) on Wednesday.
Brief Scores: Swami Vivekanand Intl: 373/6d bt Don Bosco 210 (Sahil Jadhav 49, Aayush Sawant 40; Ayush Jethwa 4/57, Akshat Pathak 3/21) & 147/3 following on (Sahil Jadhav 73*, Aaryaraj Nikam 31*) on first innings lead. VN Sule Guruji 223 & 27/1 lost to Rizvi Springfield 294 (Owais Khan 84, Mohit Tanwar 100 (93b), Prince Singh 81; Atharva Bhosale 3/87, Aman Khan 3/110) on first innings lead. Balmohan Vidyamandir (Marathi) 280 (Nisar Mulani 95, Sarvesh Shiralkar 47, Gaurang Jalgaonkar 48; Rohan Gala 4/46, Somay Khandor 3/65) & 32/1 bt BAK Swadhyay Bhavan 129 (Moksha Mehta 38; Sulakshan Lad 3/27) on first innings lead. Antonio da Silva 149 in 52.1(Om Kantak 52, Meet Rathod 45; Dhawal Mate 5/35) lost to Parle Tilak Vidyamandir (Eng) 448/4 (Sanskar Dahelkar 54, Anish More 130 (128b,21x4, 1x6), Chinmay Kelkar 72, Atish Raul 116* (131b, 17x4), Bhavesh Anbhavane 67*) on first innings lead.