Fast bowler Amit Bhandari claimed four for 35 as a star-studded North Zone crushed East Zone by seven wickets in a low scoring match of the Deodhar Trophy limited overs tournament at Vadodara on Wednesday.
After skipper Virender Sehwag elected to bowl on a wicket helpful to the seamers, North Zone bundled out East for a paltry 146 in 46 overs.
With several India batsmen -- including Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh and Dinesh Mongia besides Sehwag himself -- in their line up, North overhauled the target in 36.2 overs.
| |||||||||||
Yuvraj Singh (34) and Mongia (20 not out) chipped in with useful knocks.
From the moment they lost wicketkeeper opening batsman Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who had slammed a ton in their last match against West Zone, East found themselves in trouble and at one stage were reduced to 46 for six in the 21st over.
Rohan Gavaskar (48 off 103 balls with four boundaries and a six) and Sanjib Sanyal (unbeaten 64 off 69 balls including six boundaries and two sixes) then added 56 run for the seventh wicket to give the team total semblance of respectability.
Bhandari was well supported by Joginder Sharma (two for 31) and Dinesh Mongia (two for 38) while left arm seamer Ashish Nehra bowled an economical spell, conceding just ten runs from his ten overs with four of them being maidens.
Though Sehwag was in an attacking mood hitting East's new ball bowlers all over the park, he could not make a substantial contribution as he was caught in the slips by Gavaskar off seamer Ranadeb Bose.
Gambhir, who played a more sedate innings, added 72 runs off 15.2 overs for the second wicket with Yuvraj Singh before being caught in the slips by East skipper Devang Gandhi off Shahid Khan. Yuvraj Singh was caught behind by Dhoni off Khan for 34 runs.
However, Mongia and wicketkeeper Ajay Ratra (unbeaten 20 off 38 balls) saw to it that their team won quite handsomely with lots of overs to spare while Khan finished with two for 37.
With this win North have five points, including a bonus point, to their credit from their opening match.
Scoreboard:
East Zone
S S Das (run out) 0
M S Dhoni b A Bhandari 4
D Gandhi c A Ratra b Bhandari 3
R Gavaskar c and b D Mongia 48
L R Shukla b Bhandari 0
P Jaychandra c Y Singh b J Sharma 7
N Behera c Y Singh b H Singh 6
S Sanyal (not out) 64
S Khan lbw D Mongia 0
R Bose c A Jadeja b Bhandari 4
D Mangaraj b J Sharma 1
Extras (1-b, 2-lb, 4-nb, 2-w) 9
Total (all out in 46 overs) 146
Fall of wickets: 1-4, 2-7, 3-16, 4-16, 5-33, 6-46, 7-102, 8-104, 9-128.
Bowling: A Nehra 10-4-10-0, A Bhandari 10-2-35-4, J Sharma 8-1-31-2, H Singh 10-1-29-1, D Mongia 8-0-38-2.
North Zone
G Gambhir c D Gandhi b S Khan 44
Sehwag c R Gavaskar b R Bose 27
Y Singh c M S Dhoni b S Khan 34
D Mongia not out 20
A Ratra not out 20
Extras (1-nb, 1-w) 2
Total (for 3 wkts off 36.2 overs) 147
Fall of wickets: 1-30, 2-102, 3-113.
Bowling: R Bose 8-2-33-1, D Mangaraj 7-1-39-0, S Sanyal 2-0-11-0, S Khan 10-1-37-2, N Behera 9.2-0-27-0.
