Story CSL: It's time for trades

what a chase by sydney thunder! classic heat to lose from that position
 
what a chase by sydney thunder! classic heat to lose from that position
It may seem that way but if anything it felt the exact opposite- the Heat seemed to be up against it for the entire chase and the Thunder nearly blew it with two late wickets and a stall.

Now for some stats.
First, the table (which I forgot to attach to the last post):
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And the player chart, which I believe was requested by @yash:
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Batting: Three batsmen are over 100 runs, and their three powerful openers. Shock
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Bowling finally, and it's a lot closer here. Boland tops the standings by one run
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It's that time again- and this series will start properly Weds or Thurs, as I have finally figured out how to quicksim casual games!

Southern Conference
St Louis Rockets

Expected Lineup: Agarwal, Samarawickrama, Kusal, VJ, Permaul, Cooke, Prestwidge, Overton, Shadab, Gurney, Wood, (Bess)
Analysis: Even a talented bowling lineup can't save the mediocrity of this team.

Nashville Demons
Expected Lineup: Bancroft, R Burns, Lynn, Rossouw, Jayasuriya, vanderDussen, Rutherford, Dwarshuis, Broad, Hazlewood, Badree, (Northeast)
Analysis: This team is a great contender for the conference title. Some great players here and some very underrated players (for their spots, Dussen and Badree).

Indianapolis Inferno
Expected Lineup: HAles, Bairstow, Wright, Amla, Akmal, Raina, Braithwaite C, Danajaya, McCoy, Paris, Coad, (Hope)
Analysis: Another very strong team, however the lack of a sixth bowling option in their best 11 could cause some issues late on.

Oklahoma Hounds
Expected Lineup: Foakes, Phillips, Smith S, Turner, Patterson, Wasim, Unadkat, Boyce, Markande, de Lange, Gleeson, (Reece)
Analysis: Steve Smith needs to carry the team for a chance at the overall tournament but they have a good chance to make the finals.

Cincinatti Knights
Expected Lineup: Godleman, Harper, Elgar, Jonker, Perera A, Kleinveldt, Dube, Coulternile, Boland, Wagner, Jamieson, (Paul)
Analysis: Average batting, decent bowling, wooden spoon candidates

Memphis Stars
Expected Lineup: de Kock, Roy, Delport, Lyth, Cam Green, Axar, Emrit, Kumara, Jeetan, Musa, Ferguson, (Somerville)
Analysis: Great start lineup, particularily with some great batsman, but there are issues with batting depth- their second best bat outside of the starting lineup is Scott Borthwick.
 
We've hit a hitch for the Stars-Scorchers match that we played last night- the captures won't upload. Shame, it was a great match. The Scorchers stalled to 7/95 before the Stars got home with a four of the final ball of the match. MOTM: Marcus Stoinis for tournament-best figures of 3/8
 
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A few general updates:
* Figured out why captures failed last night- it's a general Xbox issue that would appear to have been occurring since Cyberpunk. I'll use a USB to copy them over starting tonight.
* Automated averages for batting and bowling in the BBL comp- I may do this too for the USA comp
* Each round of the USA comp will take place over three days in the holidays, and a weekend when I'm not on holidays.
* All USA teams are added, so tomorrow we begin!
Oh and more team previews.

Northeast Division
Chicago Monsters

Expected Lineup: Dhawan, Charles, Azam, Marnus, Dhoni, Sarfaraz, Neser, Pertorius, Kuggeleijn, Behrendorff, Mujeeb, (Peirson)
Thoughts: Extremely thin bowling- they haven't got a proper all rounder in the top 6. But that top 6 is one of the three best in the series.

Milwaukee Lions

Expected Lineup: Gill, Wade, Hafeez, Harvey, Dupavillon, Stoinis, Willey, Rashid, Pattinson, Khaleel, Tahir, (Iftikhar)
Thoughts: A good allround side. With David, Mills, Cottrell and Gunathilaka in depth, expect a real challenge.

Detroit Kings

Expected Lineup: Powell, Karthik, Bryant, Pope O, Behardien, Ackermann, Archer, Olivier, Anderson, Milne, Shamsi, (Edwards)
Thoughts: A good first team, but maybe slightly weak in batting and definitely very weak in reserves.

Cleveland Cannons
Expected Lineup: Cook, Jennings, Kusal, Hetmyer, Saha, Nawaz, Cummins, Jordan, Amir, Malinga, Shami, (Cornwall)
Thoughts: Weak in some ways in batting, they have a great bowling attack with the flexibility of being able to bring in Rakheem Cornwall if they need to. Poor Wahab Riaz may be traded

Philadelphia Spartans

Expected Lineup: Sibley, Buttler, Fletcher, Walton, Billings, Taylor B, Cutting, Lalor, Naseem Shah, Qais, Henry, (Brown B)
Thoughts: Dismantled Cincy in the 'systems check' game I simmed earlier today. Potent team with the ball, and Jos Buttler hit 90*, proving why he is their big star.

Washington Blizzard
Expected Lineup: Hendricks R, Maddinson, Williamson, du Plessis, Ross, Thisara, Jadhav, Laughlin, Tue, Stanlake, Rauf, (Krunal)
Thoughts: A favourite. Their starting lineup has a short tail (or a long tail?) but their batsmen are class and their bowlers all bring something different to the tail. And if they need to be flexible, their bench is otherworldly:
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East Divsion will come out tonight, then tomorrow morning we'll see Canes-Gades and then the first matches of this...
 
East Division
Atlanta Legend

Expected Lineup: Inglish, Warner, Simmons, Davies A, Stokes, Ramdin, Mathews, Faulkner, Southee, Chameera, Leach, (Briggs)
Analysis: Strong team all around. They have a few good allrounders who make it deep both with bat and ball, and they have an adequate amount of depth.

New York i actually forgot the name of this one cause I had to change it
Expected Lineup: Rizwan, Weatherald, Jacks, Handscomb, Pollard, Moeen, Hardik, Woakes, Plunkett, Thakur, Roland-Jones, (Nicholls)
Analysis: Strong batting but maybe lacking some bowling depth in the first team; however they have good depth as a squad.

Boston Rams
Expected Lineup: Wessels, Whiteman, Kohler-Cadmore, De Villiers, Fernando O, Anderson, Gregory, Viljoen, Narine, Ajaz Patel, Bosch, (Holland)
Analysis: Some good players but a crippling lack of depth.

Charlotte Giants
Expected Lineup: Donald, Stirling, Rippon, Marsh M, O'Brien. Sams, Howell, Siddle, Chawla, Richardson K, Udana, (Finn)
Analysis: Same problem as above- some great players but not even the full first team is great.

Miami Titans
Expected Lineup: Sundar, Rohit, Latham, Malan, Ballance, Iyer, Wildermuth, Santner, Morkel, Edwards, Sandeep, (Silk)
Analysis: They have the best fielder in the tournament (Jordan Silk), but they also have firepower at both ends. Expect big things

Orlando Storm
Expected Lineup: Renshaw, Pooran, Burns, Ferguson, Blundell, Allen F, Curran S, Chris Green, Bracewell, Lyon, Shinwari, (Rajitha)
Analysis: Another solid first 11; a second specialist opener wouldn't go astray, particularily as they have zero batting depth.

Tomorrow's the day...
 
Alright, managed to get captures for this one... except for lineups and overall which I forgot to take. For the Hurricanes they played an unchanged team, while Zak Evans made his BBL Debut as he and Noor Ahmad replaced Holland and Prestwidge.

The Hurricanes batted well. They lost two wickets in the first three overs- Short run out after a mixup, and McDermott missing an attempt to put Zak Evans over the short boundary and instead being his first ever wicket. However, Will Jacks played extremely well for his first ever fifty and he was helped by Ingram. However, after Jacks missed one from Lalor on the penultimate over, the final one was a fizzer with just four runs and both Ingram and Handscomb being removed by catches at backward point and mid on respectively.
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Kane Richardson and Ahmad were the bowling stars although Evans also did a good job of the
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The Renegades stuttered all the way. The openers seemed to be setting up a good platform until they were removed in consecutive balls; Finch, after taking a blow to the head, was caught plumb in front the next ball; then Harper chanced a run to mid on and didn't make it. This started a steady stream of wickets; Rossouw missed one from Lamichhane, Nabi came down to James Faulkner and was stumped; and the strike starved Marsh finally got it and then picked Ingram at deep mid wicket. Then Mac Wright was brought on and removed both set batsmen; Webster caught at mid on, Sutherland at extra cover. However, surprisingly, Kane Richardson managed to hit the Renegades to the win. The Hurricanes lamented not bowling Wright sooner.
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Wright will likely get more opportunities in the future on the strength of that
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MOTM: Will Jacks
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The US tournament is go!
Western Conference
San Fran had a stuttering start to their batting innings due to a great spell from MOTM Tom Curran and while Klaassen and Mishra pulled it back, LA got home with 11 balls to spare.
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Portland were the favourites at halfway after a storming innings from Sanju Samson. However, Joe Root with a spectacular hundred won the game for Las Vegas.
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Seattle's problem was their strike rate- their early batsmen were slow, which meant they had to go late, and this allowed Jadeja to take 4-45. Then Chris Gayle came out and bashed 111*.
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Southwestern Conference
Houston had an even worse version of San Francisco then San Francisco. Hildreth and Sangha were steady but their other top 6 all failed. It took late hitting from Christian and Kelly to get them to 164... which predictably, thanks to Uthappa mainly, was not close to enough.
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Phoenix did ok although they had a collapse of 4/15 in the middle order. However, Finch and Rahane got them home.
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A sixth consecutive chasing win seemed unlikely after Denver were 3/10 however, Maxwell and Cooper recovered to win the game.
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Southern Division
A good team effort saw Nashville post 3/189, and Hazlewood helped defend that total despite the best efforts of Cooke and Vijay and worst effort of Ben Dwarshuis.
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Oklahoma were just that bit better as a team and got the win. Not much else to say really
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Although Cincy batted much better than you would expect, they were still beaten well by Memphis who had two miserly spinners as well as a great innings by Cameron Delport
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Last two conferences tomorrow!
 
Strikers vs Sixers

Sixers brought in Jason Holder for the absent Sean Abbott, while Valente was dropped by the Strikers for Wes Agar.

The Strikers were given a good innings by Jake Weatherald although he had 0 support. He made 69* from 29 deliveries, easily scoring half his team's runs. However, Philip Salt got out in the third over, missing a Manenti yorker. Renshaw (beaten by swing), Carey (chipped to mid on) and Short (same was as Salt) all went cheaply. Wells stuck around for Weatherald until he chopped on off Dwarshuis, while Rashid scored a couple of fours right at the end.
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The Sixers were left regretting bowling Dan Christian, but happy with efforts from Manenti and Holder.
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The Sixers had a strategy- go hard off bad balls. Hughes and Philippe put on a good partnership before Philippe tried to put Rashid against the spin over the short boundary and missed. Vince picked up what was left off, then off the last ball of the eighth, which had only conceded four runs, Hughes went too hard for a boundary and was yorked. This led to some desperation and Vince getting run out going for a quick run to mid on. Henriques and Christian scored a couple of hits late on, but it wasn't enough.
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Briggs was whacked but great death bowling from Siddle won the game.
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MOTM was Weatherald although Siddle could have also been considered
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Northeast Division
no game capture for this one, blame the menus
Chicago made 6/177 off the bats of Johnson Charles (54 (31)) and Sarfaraz Ahmed (68* (47)) despite losing Dhawan from the first ball of the match to a good inswinger from Khaleel Ahmed who took 3/31. The away side lost Matt Wade and Shubman Gill in the powerplay but didn't lose another wicket with a 152 run partnership between Hafeez (54* (37)) and MOTM Danuska Gunathilaka (99* (52)) taking them home.

Detroit's batsmen just didn't do enough and despite fight at the end from Archer and Milne, 151 was never going to be enough.
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Philadelphia had Dominic Sibly and Chadwick Walton bat through most of the innings, but their smooth innings were overshadowed by Reeza Hendricks racing to 79, with a bit of hitting from Alex Ross getting Washington home.
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East Division
Despite the best efforts of Jack Leach's 4/32, Jacks, Moeen and Woakes were strong enough to get New York home.
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This was a close game. Despite seemingly not having much spark until the late arrival of Kuhn, Boston made 181. It took Charlotte every delivery to get there, with Paul Stirling scoring 68 and fellow Irish O'Brien hitting them home.
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A similarily close game. However this time the total was defended. Gary Ballance, the Miami batsman under pressure going into the game, rose to the occasion scoring 60 to lead his team to the win.
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And that draws to an end a great round! I'll post tables in most rounds but since this round is the first, there is no need. Next round I'll look for a much more neutral pitch that can produce high and low scoring games. Maybe Adelaide? Anyway, I'll take a day off from this series tomorrow (there will still be a BBL game as we'll play it tonight) for Christmas and then come back with the first five games of Round 2 on Boxing Day. See you then.
 
Merry Christmas to all followers of this series! Except my father for reasons that will be seen soon

Thunder made one change with Adam Milne fit again, while Scorchers brought back Fawad for Kurtis Patterson.
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The Thunder's innings started pretty average, losing four wickets in the first seven overs while going at about 10 an over still. Khawaja was first, picking out deep backward point after seven balls without a boundary. Then Hales hit one straight down the throat of Turner at long on, Callum Ferguson was caught well at square leg when he mistimed a glance, and Ross was dismissed in the exact same fashion as Hales. Entirely thanks to late hitting from Sams, who also became the only Thunder batsman to clear Turner, they got to 4/112, a par score.
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Behrendorff copped the brunt of Sams but AJ Tye kept it economical while the spinners picked up wickets.
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The Scorchers seemed intent on attacking the total hard. After Inglis went out in the second over, yorked by Adam Milne's faster ball, Joe Clarke went on an absolute spree. He hit 29 from 9 deliveries including three sixes before he was run out by a direct hit from Milne at cover. Munro, who had been anchoring to that point, then picked up pace as Mitch Marsh struggled to get set, eventually missing a straight one from Cutting. Munro, who had been on just 10 prior to the dismissal of Clarke, reached 47 in the ninth before chipping the final Cutting ball to cover. Despite this, the Scorchers only needed seven to win and the Thunder captain gambled on Jono Cook, reasoning he may be harder to time and pick up more wickets than Daniel Sams, considering the batsmen only needed singles and twos to win. It didn't quite come off.
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Ben Cutting was the shining light for the Thunder, although Adam Milne's performance in his first game back from injury was good too.
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Colin Munro was player of the match for his anchor innings.
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Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it in England and the Western Hemisphere!

The Heat had one change; with Swepson given bubble leave from the Test team until 1 Jan, he was eligible for selection here. The Strikers also made a change although it was due to poor form; Matt Short had scored five runs all competition and was replaced by Harry Nielsen.
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Unfortunately for the Strikers all did not go well. They lost Weatherald plumb LBW off Mujeeb in the third, but carried on to 1/48 from 4.4 overs. The next delivery was the wicket of Phil Salt, chipping the ball back to Swepson. After an economical sixth over from Wildermuth, Swepson broke the game apart, taking 3/3 from his second over. First Renshaw chipped one to Lynn at mid on, then Wells was bowled around his legs, and Nielsen picked Bryant at long off. Rashid and Carey tried to mount a recovery but Carey's timing was still off and he was eventually stumped off Ben Laughlin (regardless of what the scorecard says, it was a stumping). A couple of big swings for Briggs couldn't hide the inadequacy of 93.
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When you factor in Ben Laughlin getting a wicket he wasn't in the end credited for by the game, every Heat bowler did alright.
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While the Strikers tail couldn't mask the inadequacy of 93, the Heat top order could. Bryant was run out off a quick single in the first over, but the Heat fought back to 1/22 midway through the third before it all went south. Heazlett was caught at long on by Siddle, a ball after the first successful review of the tournament, before three balls later Lynn also departed, missing a swing off Briggs. Briggs continued for a second over and, while it leaked enough runs for the Bash Boost point to go to the Heat, it also got rid of Lawrence and Peirson because my damn controller disconnected twice. However, the Strikers weren't out of the woods yet- they had now bowled out their spinners on a deck that was clearly favouring the turning ball. While Agar did grab a wicket in his first over, it travelled. Unfortunately, Siddle is a better bowler than Wes Agar. First Wildermuth was caught behind after a top edge. Then Steketee was stumped (another game glitch), then Swepson went to hard and was caught at long off. This left the last pair to score 24 to win, and thanks to some haphazard bowling, particularily two down the legside with nobody behind square by Agar in his second over.
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The game picked Danny Briggs for MOTM but due to two wickets being disconnects, and that Swepson was better and on the winning team, I've overruled that
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First five Round 2 matches today!
No selection changes for anyone today, they will begin after this round depending on stats and form.

It got off to a huge start with Las Vegas wining their second match, thanks to a team effort in the field and a magnificent solo effort with the bat. Joe Root scored his second century of the tournament and was an easy man of the match as Las Vegas won comfortably despite a late attack from Heinrich Klaasen, one of the few San Fran players in good form.
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While Shaun Marsh batted well and had good support, 102 was never going to be enough once McDermott and Powell got onto a roll. Powell brough up the tournament's fourth century, all of them thusfar in the Western Conference. One blip for the dominant Bulldogs was the second consecutive duck for Evin Lewis.
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Portland lost Josh Philippe in the first over and while Ben Dunk and last match hero Sanju Samson got starts they were burned by runouts. However, Darcy Short picked up a brilliant 96 despite these setbacks and when he got out, Musfiqur hit hard to get Portland up to 203. San Diego lost Chris Gayle to Nijjar first ball and while Shan Masood hit hard for 90*, he couldn't carry his team home.
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Destruction. After the openers for Austin put on 49, they went in the same Ngidi over and nobody else passed 15. Dallas's batting efforts were also poor, showing that the wicket was awful, but they did more than enough to win. This match was particularily notable for the one partnership that did take up some time after the openers in the Austin innings- the ninth, with Imran Qayyum (4 off 17) and Alzarri Joseph (3 off 17)- being incredibly slow.
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Houston had 5 batsman between 20 and 30, and 6 batsman between 0 and 6. Kansas' batsmen, Colin Munro's golden globe aside, carried on their starts to 40s and 50s. That was the difference in batting. Bowling was even more dominant for Kansas.
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Five more Round Two matches:

Martin Guptill batted well but unfortunately he got no help until the redhot Tommy Cooper came in late. This proved to be the cost for Denver as Phoenix had three good innings by Duckett, Dickwella and Denly, and that got them home. Phehlukwayo got MOTM though for being the only bowler to really impress in the game.
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St Louis batted decently as a team but missed some individual efforts, paving the way for a fourth wicket partnership of Amla and Akmal to win the game for Indianapolis.
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The great effort from Christiaan Jonker was undone with his dismissal which sparked a collapse of 5/8 from Cincy, one they would never recover from. Sam Badree bowled brilliantly.
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In Batting both Adam Lyth and Ashton Turner carried their teammates to scores of around 170. However the Oklahomans bowled considerably better, particular Imad, and that won them the game.
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Finally another game where capturing failed. Detroit would have been very happy with their score of 5/187 with a good contribution from Bryant (57 (38)) and some late hitting from Ackermann (51* (18)). However, they failed to take a wicket until 28 were required. Shikhar Dhawan (112* (54)) and Johnson Charles (71 (48)) plundered all of the attack except Jofra Archer, and that meant an easy win for Chicago (1/189).
 
The final fixtures!

Philadelphia had the best players on the park in Sibly, Fletcher and MOTM Qais Ahmed. However, they were screwed by a series of short but cheerful innings from Milwaukee who just squeezed home.
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A-la Boston-Charlotte, Cleveland won with a boundary from the final delivery. While Reeza Hendricks gave Washington the advantage, Shimron Hetmyer levelled the ground while then Wriddiman Saha got them home.
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Oh. Oh dear.
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This is just a typical match. Rohit Sharma and Shreyas Iyer trumping Rizwan and Ali.
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Despite an near-century from Renshaw, Boston got home thanks to some late hitting from Heino Kuhn.
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Stats update imminent!
 

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