Railways stun Karnataka

 Karnataka’s Vijay Hazare Trophy title defence began on a disappointing note as a spirited Railways pulled off a thrilling one-wicket victory on the last ball against the hosts in their opening Group ‘B’ encounter here at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on Thursday.

Put into bat, Karnataka struggled their way to a modest total of 228 for nine in 50 overs. Skipper R Vinay Kumar top-scored with an unbeaten 50 while Mayank Agarwal contributed 44 in an otherwise sloppy batting performance. Right-arm medium pacer Akshat Pandey (3/45) and left-arm spinner Ashish Yadav (3/25) shared six wickets between them for the visitors.

For Railways, a breezy 50 from opener Asad Pathan and the crucial 78-run sixth-wicket stand between Mahesh Rawat (50) and captain Karn Sharma (51) put them past the target. Vinay dazzled with the ball too for the defending champions (4/45) and kept his side in the hunt. He bagged the important wicket of Rawat in the 42nd over and Railways, who were cruising towards the target, suddenly went into a shell, losing couple of wickets in the process. But luckily for the visitors, Pandey (19 n.o.) backed up his good bowling with some gutsy batting.

With two runs needed from the final over and with just one wicket remaining, the job was not yet complete for the visitors. Starting with a dot ball, left-arm pacer S Arvind conceded a single in the second delivery. Arvind did well to give away no run in the next three balls but Pandey edged a full toss past the second slip off the final ball of the match to heave a sigh of relief.

Apart from a few good catches, Karnataka’s fielding lacked intensity and they would like to address their batting woes ahead of their second encounter against Haryana on Friday.

Earlier, opener Agarwal began in typical aggressive fashion and helped Karnataka race to 50 in 9 overs. Agarwal was dropped on 39 at first slip by Karn but the attacking batsman failed to capitalise on the reprieve, as he was out caught at the same region off Pandey, just one over later.

Consuming 58 balls for his 27, Rahul never looked convincing in his 103-minute stay and the opener was out bowled, attempting a slog sweep off Yadav.

From 96 for two, Karnataka added just four runs and lost two wickets. Manish Pandey came down the track to his namesake but played a half-hearted cut to hand a simple catch at point. Nair followed soon, falling for a miscued pull to give Pandey his third wicket.

CM Gautam (21) and Stuart Binny (18) put on 37 runs but couldn’t convert their starts as Karnataka were reduced to 139 for six in the 35th over.

Left alone to stage the recovery act, Vinay did well to keep the scoreboard moving with singles and doubles. With 5.4 overs remaining, Abhimanyu Mithun (28) used the long handle to good effect. Mithun smashed three sixes in the 49th over off Karn before Vinay gathered two fours and a straight six in the final over of Anureet Singh, as Karnataka fetched 39 runs in the last two overs. 

score board

KARNATAKA: Mayank Agarwal c Pathan b Pandey 44 (48b, 8x4), KL Rahul b Yadav 27 (58b, 2x4), Karun Nair c Upadhyay b Pandey 20 (40b, 3x4), Manish Pandey c Ghosh b A Pandey 2 (6b), Stuart Binny c Rawat b Sharma 18 (26b, 2x4), CM Gautam lbw Yadav 21 (26b, 3x4), Vinay Kumar (not out) 50 (48b, 4x4, 2x6), Anirudha Joshi b Sharma 0 (7b), J Suchith c Rawat b Yadav 11 (23b), Abhimanyu Mithun c Pandey b Anureet 28 (18b, 3x6), S Arvind (not out) 0 (0b). Extras (W-5, LB-2) 7. Total (for 9 wkts, 50 overs) 228.

Fall of wickets: 1-60 (Agarwal), 2-96 (Rahul), 3-99 (Pandey), 4-100 (Nair), 5-137 (Binny), 6-139 (Gautam), 7-140 (Joshi), 8-163 (Suchith), 9-212 (Mithun).

Bowling: Anureet Singh 10-0-55-1 (w-2), KK Upadhyay 10-1-41-0 (w-1), Akshat Pandey 10-1-45-3 (w-1), Ashish Singh 2-0-5-0 (w-1), Ashish Yadav 10-1-25-3, Karn Sharma 8-0-55-2.

RAILWAYS: Asad Pathan c Joshi b Suchith 50 (45b, 10x4), Saurabh Wakaskar c Rahul b Mithun 0 (2b), Ashish Singh lbw Vinay 0 (5b), Arindam Ghosh b Arvind 7 (20b), R Jonathan lbw Vinay 22 (60b, 1x4), Mahesh Rawat c Gautam b Vinay 50 (57b, 5x4), Karn Sharma c Rahul b Joshi 51 (64b, 3x4, 4x6), Ashish Yadav c Pandey b Vinay 0 (12b), Akshat Pandey (not out) 19 (19b, 2x4), Anureet Singh c Gautam b Joshi 18 (13b, 2x4, 1x6), K Upadhyay (not out) 2 (3b). Extras (W-7, LB-6) 13. Total (for 9 wkts, 50 overs) 232.

Fall of wickets: 1-7 (Wakaskar), 2-14 (Ashish), 3-51 (Arindam), 4-70 (Pathan), 5-112 (Jonathan), 6-190 (Rawat), 7-192 (Yadav), 8-194 (Karn), 9-222 (Anureet).

Bowling: R Vinay Kumar 10-1-45-4 (w-2), Abhimanyu Mithun 8-0-39-1 (w-2), S Arvind 9-1-40-1 (w-2), Stuart Binny 7-1-34-0, J Suchith 7.4-37-1, Anirudha Joshi 8.2-1-31-2 (w-1).