North Zone
On the fourth and penultimate day of Delhi’s campaign in the Syed Mushtaq Ali trophy 2016/17, skipper Gautam Gambhir finally found some form as the left-handed batsman steered Delhi to a win over Haryana. After being invited to bat, Haryana could score just 114 runs at loss of seven wickets in the allotted 20 overs of the game. Navdeep Saini, who has just been called to the India A squad for the Practice game against Australia did a decent job with the ball as he conceded 26 runs for one wicket in four overs.
Delhi had all the hopes on the openers Gautam Gambhir and Shikhar Dhawan. Gambhir had a good start as he settled himself well on the crease right from the start but Dhawan disappointed as he was dismissed on a score of 3. Unmukt Chand too failed with the bat as he was back in the Pavillion without troubling the scorers, which put Delhi under pressure in the race to such a low target. A contribution of 21 from Nitish Rana and a half-century from Gautam Gambhir helped Delhi to escape a loss against Haryana, which they only achieved when just six balls were left in the game.
Joginder Sharma was the star with the ball for Haryana as he grabbed two wickets at just 15 runs in four overs.
Brief Scores:
Delhi 115/5 defeats Haryana 114/7 by five wickets at Dharamsala.
Jammu & Kashmir 123/10 defeats Himachal Pradesh 105/9 by18 runs at Nadaun.
East Zone
Wriddhiman Saha, who has just been called in the Test squad, made his mark in the domestic circuit as opening the innings for Bengal in a race to target of 147, the Indian wicket-keeper played an innings of 74*, scoring 150 runs for the first wicket with Shreevats Goswami (71*) to lead Bengal to a 10 wicket win over Assam. Saha smashed a total of 10 fours and a six in his innings.
Bengal chased down the target of 147 in just 16 overs with 24 balls to spare. It was great innings by Saha to prove the selectors right that they haven’t made any mistake by selecting him in place of Parthiv Patel.