MATCH REPORT
Follow UsSouth demolishes North- Not a surprise
The gulf in quality between North Zone and South Zone has never been more contrast as it was on Monday. In response to South Zone’s 304-run target, the Nitish Rana-led South Zone could only muster 60 runs, and lost the match by 185 runs according to the VJD Method.
With multiple rain interruptions, North would have loved for the rain to continue when it arrived in full flow in the 18th over of the run-chase when they had already lost six wickets for barely nothing on the board. But as soon as rain god relented, Puducherry groundsmen were quick to arrange things back immediately, for the South Zone to complete the formality.
The star of the Duleep Trophy final, Vidwath Kaverappa was, once again, the star of the show as he grabbed no less than five wickets to break North Zone’s back. Vyshak Vijaykumar eked out a couple of wickets to fundamentally ensure North had no way to comeback in the game.
Earlier in the day, it was Mayank Agarwal and Rohan S Kunnummal who laid the foundation for South to establish a huge total on the board. Later, N Jagadeesan, the highest run-scorer in the last year’s Vijay Hazare Trophy, pushed things forward with another excellent knock of 72 runs, and that resulted in South crossing the 300-run barrier.
East bowlers power Central demolition
In the Duleep Trophy a few weeks ago, Central Zone had demolished East Zone’s hopes in a flash. In a devastating spell of bowling, they downed East to their knees in the quarterfinal, but as colours were splashed across the shirts later, East have found a new lease of life.
On the opening day of the Deodhar Trophy in Pondicherry, MB Mura Singh, Akash Deep, and Shahbaz Ahmed picked three wickets each to bowl Central Zone out for a mere 207 runs. Apart from Rinku Singh (54) and opener Aryan Juyal (39*), none of the other top and middle batters had any upside to offer. Karn Sharma added 32 runs at the end to power Central above the 200-run mark to stay afloat.
In response, an opening partnership of 91 runs between Abhimanyu Easwaran and Utkarsh Singh laid the foundation for the East to track down the 208-run target. While Abhimanyu was slow, Jharkhand opener Utkarsh was sensible in his approach to hold one end up together. Virat Singh joined him later but he couldn’t add much value to create an opening for Central to make a comeback.
Bolstered with the bowling line-up of Aniket Chaudhray, Shivam Mavi, Yash Thakur, Aditya Sarvate, and Karn Sharma, Central still had an opening, but Odisha’s Subhranshu Senapati decided to bide his time in the middle to tilt the game back once again. Senapati’s 65-ball unbeaten stay yielded just 33 runs, but that was enough for East to safely add four points to the tally.
Panchal 99* powers West to easy win
On the face value itself, North East Zone never had a chance against West Zone. It was impressive that they went on to post over 200 runs in their maiden appearance in the Deodhar Trophy. A squad largely comprised local players, North East rode on vital contributions from skipper Langlonyamba M (30), Imliwati (39) and Palzor (29) to post 207 runs with Arzan Nagwaswalla (3), Shams Mulani (2), and Shivam Dube (2) doing bulk of the damage.
The run-chase was easy peasy for West Zone later, with skipper Priyank Panchal taking the onus of carnage on himself. Alongside Harvik Desai, he ensured that North-East had nowhere to hide and that was exacerbated by the fact that they were both batting at a strike rate of 120 for the majority of the match. Unfortunately for Panchal, West reached the target with the skipper needing one more run to get to his century. But he couldn’t have asked for a more comprehensive performance from his side.
