Devdutt Padikkal has maintained his excellent form in four consecutive matches in the Vijay Hazare Trophy. He has scored the most number of runs in the tournament till now. He has made 427 runs in 4 matches. These runs have come with an impressive strike rate of 92.83.
Here’s what all happened on the seventh day of the Vijay Hazare Trophy.
1. Karnataka vs Kerala – Elite Group C
Karnataka won the toss and elected to field first.
Kerala lost two early wickets in the form of Robin Uthappa and Sanju Samson. Uthappa made a golden duck and Samson could only score 3 runs. Vishnu Vinod could also not score much and was dismissed for 29 runs.
Vathsal Govind and Sachin Baby then lifted Kerala’s innings from these early setbacks. Both of them added 114 runs for the fourth wicket. Abhimanyu Mithun dismissed Baby after he made 54 runs off 63 balls. Govind however continued his batting with Mohammed Azharuddeen. Both of them added 50 runs for the fifth wicket. Govind missed a well-deserved hundred and was dismissed for 95 runs. Abhimanyu Mithun provided the breakthrough to Karnataka. Azharuddeen remained not out and made 59 off 38 balls. Kerala made 277 runs with a loss of eight wickets in 50 overs.
Abhimanyu Mithun took a fifer. He gave 52 runs in 10 overs.
Karnataka had a start, which cemented their position in the match. Ravikumar Samarth and Devdutt Padikkal added 99 runs for the first wicket in 18.2 overs. Jalaj Saxena dismissed Samarth, and he made 62 off 51 balls. Krishnamurthy Siddharth then joined Padikkal in the middle. Both of them sealed the game for Karnataka. Padikkal made 126 off 138 balls. It was his second consecutive hundred in the tournament. Siddharth made 86 off 84 balls. Karnataka won the game by 9 wickets.
2. Railways vs Uttar Pradesh – Elite Group C
Railways won the toss and elected to field first.
Saurabh Singh removed Karan Sharma in the second over of the innings. He could only make 5 runs. Abhishek Goswami then operated the innings with Priyam Garg. Their experiments couldn’t work for a long time as Saurabh Singh dismissed Goswami in 13th over. He made 32 off 28 balls.
Garg along with Akshdeep Nath started the repair process again. This time both of them were successful. Garg made 115 off 99 balls and Nath made 93 off 99 balls. UP made 346 runs in 50 overs.
Railways had a decent start. Mrunal Devdhar made 36 off 33 balls. Shivam Mavi dismissed him in the eighth over of the innings. Pratham Singh, the other opener, also followed his partner after playing the same amount of deliveries. He made 33 off 33 balls. Shivam Chaudhary was in the middle when Singh was dismissed. He saw his other teammates getting departed from one end of the wicket. Saurabh Singh joined him after four wickets fell. Both of them added 117 runs for the fifth wicket.
Shivam Mavi removed Singh from the middle and the match was transferred to UP’s side. No other batsmen could provide support to Shivam. Bhubaneswar Kumar removed him after he made 107 runs off 93 balls. In the end, UP won the game by 70 runs.
3. Odisha vs Bihar – Elite Group C
Bihar won the toss and elected to bat first.
Sakibul Gani and Mangal Mahrour added 95 runs for the first wicket for Bihar. Shantanu Mishra dismissed Gani for 48 runs. Shantanu also dismissed Mahrour for 38 runs.
Babul Kumar tried saving Bihar’s innings. He made 78 off 71 balls. He helped Bihar to finish 50 overs with 255 runs on board.
Shantanu Mishra and Sandeep Pattnaik had a partnership of 124 runs for the first wicket. Mishra made 76 off 107 balls. Pattnaik made 64 off 81 balls. Kartik Biswal and Ankit Yadav made 53 off 46 balls and 43 off 39 balls, respectively. Odisha chased down the total in 48.1 overs. They won the game by 7 wickets.
4. Tamil Nadu vs Jharkhand – Elite Group B
Tamil Nadu won the toss and elected to bat first.
Baba Aparajith and Narayan Jagadeesan added 59 runs for the first wicket before Anukul Roy dismissed Jagadeesan. He made 30 off 54 balls. Aparajith went on to score a half-century. He made 57 off 105 balls.
Shahrukh Khan’s 51 off 47 balls and Jagatheesan Kousik’s 55 off 40 balls helped Tamil Nadu to make 266 runs in 50 overs.
Anukul Roy took 3 wickets for Jharkhand.
Virat Singh and Sumit Kumar tried saving Jharkhand’s innings after three wickets fell. Both of them made 40+ runs. But once they were dismissed, no one was there to save Jharkhand’s innings. Rahul Shukla made 42 off 25 balls, but that was not enough. Jharkhand lost the game by 67 runs.
5. Vidarbha vs Punjab – Elite Group B
Punjab won the toss and elected to field first.
Vidarbha’s Faiz Fazal hit his second century in this tournament. He made 101 runs off 99 balls. Ganesh Satish’s 78 off 82 and Akshay Wadkar’s 63 off 53 balls helped Vidarbha to score 290 runs in 50 overs. Six batsmen from Vidarbha could not cross the double-figure mark.
Punjab’s opener, Prabhsimran Singh single-handedly took the game away from Vidarbha. He made 167 runs off 140 balls. Punjab won the game by 4 wickets.
6. Madhya Pradesh vs Andhra – Elite Group B
Andhra won the toss and elected to field first.
MP’s openers, Abhishek Bhandari and Shubham Sharma had a hundred-run partnership for the first wicket. Bhandari made 49 off 75 balls. Sharma made 78 off 111 balls.
Other batsmen capitalized on the start provided by the openers. Rajat Patidar made 102 runs off 61 balls. MP crossed the 300 runs mark with the help of these innings. MP made 316 runs in 50 overs.
Andhra’s batsmen failed to chase the target. Nitish Reddy was the highest scorer for his team. He made 59 runs off 67 balls.
Andhra lost the game by 98 runs.
7. Gujarat vs Hyderabad – Elite Group A
Hyderabad won the toss and elected to field first.
Het Patel made 67 off 81 balls and Karan Patel made 78 off 85 balls for Gujarat. No other batsmen could help Gujarat enough. They made 222 runs in 50 overs.
Both Tanmay Agarwal and Bavanaka Sandeep made 54 runs for Hyderabad. Hyderabad was dismissed for 210 runs in 48 overs. Gujarat won the game by 12 runs.
8. Baroda vs Chhattisgarh – Elite Group A
Baroda won the toss and elected to field first.
With the help from Krunal Pandya’s 133 off 100 balls and Vishnu Solanki’s 78 off 99 balls, Baroda was able to make 332 runs in 50 overs. Atit Sheth added 51 runs off just 16 balls. He hit 7 sixes.
For Chhattisgarh, Amandeep Khare made 67 off 77 balls, Ashutosh Singh made 55 off 59 balls, and Ajay Jadav Mandal made 65 off 46 balls. Their innings helped Chhattisgarh to cross the 300-run mark. But these innings were not enough for the team to come out as the winner. Chhattisgarh made 319 runs in 50 overs with the loss of 9 wickets. Baroda won the game by 13 runs.
9. Tripura vs Goa – Elite Group A
Goa won the toss and opted to field first.
Goa’s Lakshay Garg was the difference-maker for them. He took a fifer. Milind Kumar of Tripura made 68 off 89 balls. Tripura made 216 runs in 50 overs.
Goa’s chase was also not smooth. They lost seven wickets while chasing the target. Eknath Kerkar’s 92 off 126 sealed the game for Goa. They won the game by 3 wickets in 45.3 overs.
