Punjab, Vidarbha and Saurashtra enter quarterfinals of Syed Mushtaq Ali tournament
Punjab, Vidarbha and Saurashtra advanced to the quarter-finals of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy T20 cricket tournament by winning their respective matches here on Sunday. Punjab beat Haryana by 49 runs in the pre-quarterfinals. When invited to bat first, Punjab scored 176 for seven with Prabhsimran Singh’s 64 off 36 balls and Abhishek Sharma’s 55 not out. In reply, Haryana’s team could only manage 127 runs for nine wickets.
Nishant Sindhu scored 42 runs from his side. For Punjab, Baltej Singh took three wickets while Siddharth Kaul and Mayank Markandey took two wickets each. In another match, Vidarbha beat Chhattisgarh by five wickets with eight balls to spare. Vidarbha allowed Chhattisgarh to make 111 runs for nine wickets with the brilliant bowling of Umesh Yadav (3 for 27). Captain Harpreet Singh contributed 27 and Amandeep Khare contributed 25 runs for Chhattisgarh. Vidarbha scored 112 runs for five wickets in 18.4 overs with the help of 63 runs from opener Sanjay Raghunath.
Saurashtra beat Kerala by nine runs in another match. Batting first, Saurashtra scored 183 for six with the help of Sheldon Jackson’s 64 and then restricted Kerala to 174 for four. Sachin Baby scored 64 and Sanju Samson scored 59 runs for Kerala. In the quarterfinals, Punjab will face Karnataka, Vidarbha will face Delhi, Saurashtra will face Mumbai and Himachal Pradesh will face Bengal.
