The Executive Committee of the Poona Hoteliers Association (PHA) successfully effectuated the 6th Edition of its Premier League Cricket Tournament (PHAPL 6.0) at the Azam Campus Grounds on 17th March’24.
The 6-day Tournament was ceremoniously inaugurated on 12th March’24 by former Captain of the Indian National Hockey Team and 4 times Olympian, Bharat Khel Ratna and Arjuna Awardee, Dhanraj Pillai. Rahul Singh and Satnam Kaur former Indian National Men’s & Women’s Olympic Team members respectively also joined the opening ceremony in the gracious presence of Chancellor Dr P. A Inamdar, University President M.C.E. Society.
As always it was a colourful spectacle, full of enthusiasm, excitement, vigour, zest & zeal with an all-time high participation of 45 Teams from various Hotels, Hotel Management Institutes & Malls rearing to enter the field and display their cricketing talent. The Ground had a strength of 675 players and over 1000 super excited spectators from the Hospitality Fraternity in a sporty mood, all set to cheer their respective teams to victory.
The above Dignitaries, Amit Sharma, President PHA, Rahul Panwar Chairman and the entire PHAPL 6.0 Organising Committee had the following common inaugural message for all present “Let this prestigious and popular Cricket Tournament be the start of many such sports and related activities wherein Dhanraj Pillai further motivated all the participating Teams in his extremely encouraging inaugural speech. The Dignitaries present encouraged the Teams to “Play Well, Play Hard but Play Fair” and released the Tri-Colour Balloons as a Symbol of declaring the Tournament Open.
The 6.0 Edition of the Tournament evolved to another high as Live Screening of all 60 matches over 6 days was successfully televised as compared to 52 matches over 5 days last year. Like any other International Cricketing action here too complete match scores n related analysis was professionally executed.
The viewership from 1000 on-field spectators went up in multiples touching several over 5000 with colleagues at work and families at home joining in the action. Even the hot weather conditions could not scorch the spirits of the participating teams and the Director of the Tournament Manu, Umpires, Scorers and the Groundsmen did a fabulous job in maintaining the continuity of the League.
For the first time in the Premier League’s history of 6 years we had yet another Winner wherein the Phoenix Market City l, Pune lifted the much coveted Trophy defeating Novotel, Pune who in turn were the Runners-up. JW Marriott and Hotel Crowne Plaza were the other two teams to reach the Top Four.
Orange Cap was awarded to Mangesh from Pride Hotel. The Purple Cap and Man of the Series award was claimed by Rajapal from Novotel Hotel. The Best Bowler award was clinched by Kiran of Phoenix Market City. The Best Batter award was won by Akram from Crowne Plaza. The Man of the Match award for the Final was won by Ajinkya from Phoenix Market City.
The Poona Hoteliers Association President, Amit Sharma expressed his gratitude to all the Sponsors & Hospitality Partners, namely The Moments, Svva, Estuary, Horizon Placements, AV Lead, EV Dock, Creative Eye and many more, whose support was instrumental in making PHAPL 6.0 a roaring success.
After 5 flourishing Inter Hotel Cricket Tournaments, PHAPL 6.0 was the 6th in the series of this extremely popular and the most sought-after sporting action amongst the Pune Hospitality Fraternity and the credit for its Super Success goes to the following PHAPL 6.0 Cricket Tournament Organising Committee Members – Amit Sharma, Rahul Panwar, Sharan Shetty, Prapti Deshpande, Sumit Sharma, Vinay Nair, Vaibhav Lamba, Abhishek Sahai, Melvyn Saldanha, Sandeep Singh, Bhushan Kumud, Pankaj Saxena & Sanjay Singh.
In addition to the above Arun Nayar, Vikramraj Shetty, Neerav Panchamia, Shrinivas Chaphalkar, Dev Kumar, C R Vinoj, Rajib Das, Rahul Paliwal, Prabhakar Shetty & many PHA Members were present for the inaugural and closing ceremony of the PHAPL 6.0.
The PHA Executive Committee is all excited and geared up to take PHAPL 7.0 2025 to even greater heights.
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