Shahbaz Ahmed produced a brilliant all-round performance to power Bengal to a dominating 43-run win over Tamil Nadu in their Elite Group E match of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy .
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The 27-year-old from Haryana led Bengal’s aggressive batting display with an unbeaten 27-ball 42 laced with three fours and two maximums to take the team to 164 for six after opting to bat. He then returned to scalp three crucial wickets with his left-arm spin to completely derail Tamil Nadu’s run chase as they ended with 121 for 9 in their stipulated 20 overs. Shahbaz’s pyrotechnics helped Bengal finish with a flourish after skipper Abhimanyu Easwaran (38), Sudip Gharami (27) and Ritwik Chowdhury (32) set it up with useful knocks.
Washington Sundar (2/24) took two wickets, while Sai Kishore (1/20), T Natarajan (1/26) and Varun Chakravarthy (1/39) grabbed one each. Chasing 165 for a win, TN opener Sai Sudharsan blasted a 48-ball 64 with four boundaries and two sixes but did not get any support from the other end. Shahbaz was in the thick of things right from the start as opener N Jagadeesan holed out to him off Akash Deep in the second over and then the spinner stuck twin blows in three balls to reduce TN to 50 for 3 in the ninth over.
He dismissed Baba Aparajith (16) and Sanjay Yadav (0) before getting rid off Washington Sundar (4) as TN’s batting fell apart after that. Besides Shahbaz, Mukesh Kumar (2/33), Pradipta Pramanik (2/13), Writtick Chatterjee (1/19) and Akash Deep (1/28) were the other wicket-takers. In another match, Odisha pulled off a one-wicket win over Chandigarh in a last-ball thriller, riding on Rakesh Pattnaik’s unbeaten 61 off 24 balls.
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Sent in to bat, Chandigarh posted 179 for 6 with Bhagmender Lather making 59 off 41 balls with seven maximums and Raj Bawa slamming 40 off 17 balls. In reply, Odisha were down 5 for 2 but they recovered from the disastrous start with Shantanu Mishra (39) and Subhranshu Senapati (47) playing a big role in keeping them in the hunt. Pattnaik then smashed seven boundaries and four sixes to take Odisha home in the last ball. For Chandigarh, Jagjit Singh snapped four wickets.
Kaverappa bags career-best 5/11 in Karnataka win Mullanpur
Pacer Vidhwath Kaverappa bagged a career-best 5/11 as fancied Karnataka recorded a convincing 34-run win over Jammu & Kashmir in their Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy Group C match here on Sunday.
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Batting first, Karnataka were restricted to 147 for seven in the stipulated 20 overs, but the total proved to be more than enough as Jammu & Kashmir were bowled out for 113 in 18.2 overs.
For J & K, India’s pace sensation Umran Malik returned figures of 1/37 from his full quota of four overs, while Abid Mushtaq and Rithik Singh picked up two wickets each.
The J & K team kept losing wickets at regular intervals, failing to pose a threat to their much stronger opponents despite Vivrant Sharma’s 46-ball 63.
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Tottering at 31 for six in the seventh over, Abid Mushtaq chipped in with 32 off 26 balls to give J & K’s total a semblance of respectability.
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However, Mushtaq’s effort was never going to win his team the match as the damage been done inside the powerplay. They were 4/5 in three overs.
Besides Kaverappa, who was playing in only his fourth T20 match, there were two wickets apiece for Vasuki Koushik and Vijaykumar Vyshak.
Earlier, Karnataka also kept losing wickets until Shreyas Gopal steadied the ship with a 48 off 38 balls. Manoj Bhandage, then, blazed away to a 23-ball 41, hitting four sixes and two boundaries to prop up Karnataka.
