Delhi brush J&K aside

A comprehensive performance by Delhi helped them beat Jammu & Kashmir by 125 runs in their opening encounter of the North Zone leg of the National one-day championship for the Vijay Hazare Trophy here on Monday.

Put into bat, Delhi were all out for 245 in 49.4 overs but their bowlers kept things tight to bundle out J&K for a paltry 120 in 41.1 overs. The huge win ensured a bonus point for the hosts.

Delhi skipper Rajat Bhatia (3/17) and pacer Parvinder Awana (3/23) were the most successful bowlers while veteran Ashish Nehra (1/16) also looked in good rhythm during his five-over opening spell.

Pradeep Sangwan (2/17) also chipped in with two wickets. It was a battle of unequals and J&K lacked quality batsmen who could face the tried and tested performers like Nehra, Awana and Bhatia. But credit should be given J&K bowlers especially the two spinners — leggie Bandeep Singh (2/30) and left-arm spinner Raman Datta (2/32) — who stemmed the flow of runs from Delhi batsmen in the middle overs.

Harbhajan wicketless
Harbhajan Singh went wicketless on his return to competitive cricket but led his team to comfortable four-wicket win over Haryana.

Brief scores:
Delhi: 245 all out in 49.4 (Unmukt Chand 46, Mithun Manhas 41, Mohit Sharma 36; Samiullah Beigh 3-52) bt J&K: 120 all out in 41.1 overs (Rajat Bhatia 3-17, Parvinder Awana 3-23).

Haryana: 243/6 in 50 overs (Nitin Saini 77, Sandeep Godara 39, Sunny Singh 36, Sachin Rana 59 n.o.; Manpreet Singh Gony 2-40) lt to Punjab: 247/6 in 46.4 overs (Karan Goel 41, Gurkirat Ahluwalia 43, Mandeep Singh 39, Amitoze Singh 76 n.o., Bipul Sharma 29; Harshal Patel 2-41).

Himachal Pradesh: 291/7 in 50 overs (Prashant Chopra 60, Paras Dogra 114, Sridharan Sriram 45, Rishi Dhawan 25; Suraj Yadav 2-39, Nishan Singh 3-33) bt Services: 273/7 in 50 overs (Yashpal Singh 108 n.o., Soumyaranjan Swain 36, Sanjeev Mishra 51; Jitender Mehta 2-46, Abhinav Bali 2-47).