Delhi, Mumbai, TN, Karnataka, Railways, J&K, Punjab win in Mushtaq Ali T20

Big boys of domestic cricket Delhi, Mumbai, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka won but Uttar Pradesh and Haryana were stunned by the Railways and Jammu & Kashmir respectively in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Twenty20 zonal matches on Wednesday.

In Dharamsala, Delhi rode on India opener Shikhar Dhawan's unbeaten 82 off 47 deliveries to chase down the Services' total of 131-7 with six overs to spare.

In another North Zone contest at Dharamsala, Punjab beat the home team by 23 runs, successfully defending their total of 162-7.

In another North Zone match at Nadaun in Himachal Pradesh, J&K pipped Haryana by four runs. J&K opted to bat first on a good wicket and managed to score 156-3. Opner Shabham Khajuria (68) was the highest run-getter for his side, followed by Mithun Manhas (31) and capitan Ien Dev singh (27).

For Haryana, Harshal Patel, Ashish Hooda and Chaitanya Bishnoi took one wicket each. In reply, Haryana fell short by just four runs. Shivam Chauhan scored 43 off 27 balls and capitan Rajat Palival made 31.

It was the experienced Ram Dayal again who exceptionally bowled well and picked up two wickets for 27 for his team J&K, with figures of 4-0-27-2. He was well supported by Umar Nazir, Manzoor Dar, Manik Gupta and Deepak Dogra who shared/picked one wicket each.

In Vadodara, Mumbai hammered Maharashtra by six wickets in a West Zone battle. Maharashtra scored 148-7, with contributions from Ankit Bawne (50) and Nikhil Maik (39). Later, captain Aditya Tare's blistering 71 helped Mumbai win by eight wickets.

In another match of this zone, Irfan Pathan's 65 not out helped Baroda beat Saurashtra, who had scored 160-4, by three wickets. Prerak Mankad (64) and Cheteshwar Pujara (44) starred for Saurashtra.

In two Central Zone matches played at Jaipur, the Railways and Rajasthan prevailed over Uttar Pradesh and Chattisgarh respectively.

The Railways posted 148-8, thanks to Mahesh Rawat's 58 not out, before bowling out Uttar Pradesh for a meagre total of 58 in 13.3 overs. Amit Mishra, Manjeet Singh, Karn Sharma and Ashish Singh picked up two wickets apeice for the Railways.

Meanwhile, Chattisgarh fell short by 25 runs chasing Rajasthan's 161-6.

In the South Zone matches at Chennai, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala won over Hyderabad, Andhra and Goa respectvely.

Vijay Shankar (69) helped Tamil Nadu put up a total of 179-5. During the chase, Ricky Bhui (61) waged a lone battle as Andhra could only score 142-6.

Karnataka rode on inspired bowling performances from Sreenath Aravind (3-25) and J. Suchith (2-18) to get the better of Hyderabad by 14 runs. Karnataka had scored 148-7, driven by Mayank Agarwal's sparkling 65.

During the chase, Hyderabad were restricted to 134-6. S. Badrinath (37 not out) and Akshat Reddy (42) kept their team in good position but Aravind and Suchith came up crucial blows to propell Karnataka to victory.

In anther match, Kerala thrashed Goa by nine wickets.

--IANS

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