Rahane slams 95 as Mumbai crush Odisha by 9 wickets

Lucknow, Dec 8 (PTI) Senior batter Ajinkya Rahane struck a scintillating 56-ball 95 as heavyweights Mumbai made short work of Odisha en route to a nine-wicket victory in a Group A match of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy here on Monday.

After Odisha posted what seemed a respectable 167 for seven, riding on a collective effort from their top and middle-order batters, Rahane took charge of the situation while putting on 74 runs for the first wicket with Sarfaraz Khan, who blazed away to a 15-ball 28 to put Mumbai in command.

Rahane, the out-of-favour India batter in Tests, was not out when victory was achieved at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium.

After the dismissal of Sarfaraz, the 37-year-old Rahane was associated in an unbroken second-wicket partnership of 94 runs with Angkrish Raghuvanshi, who helped himself to a breezy 38 in 26 balls, as Mumbai completed the chase of 168 with as many as four overs to spare.

During his stay in the middle, Rahane smashed nine fours and three sixes and forced Odisha skipper Biplab Samantray to use as many as seven bowlers.

As far as the Mumbai bowling unit is concerned, Suryansh Shedge was the most successful on the day with figures of 3/46 in four overs, while there were two wickets for Sairaj Patil (2/42 in 4 overs).

Yash Thakur shines in Vidarbha win ======================= Vidarbha pacer Yash Thakur halted Andhra in its tracks by grabbing four wickets to guide his side to a 19-run victory in their final round match of the T20 tournament.

Andhra, who have already qualified for the next stage along with Mumbai from the group, failed to overhaul Vidarbha's 154/8, with the 26-year-old right-hand bowler returning excellent figures of 4/22 to restrict the opponents to 135/9.

Thakur, who also had a five-wicket haul in an earlier match, ended his SMAT campaign with 18 scalps.

Vidarbha's innings revolved around Aman Mokhade's 50 and keeper-batter Akshay Wadkar, who scored a 33-ball 41 with Andhra pacer Satyanarayana Raju's 4/26 playing a big role in restricting the opponents to a below-average score.

However, Andhra fared even worse when they came out to bat, losing three wickets for 31 runs including India player Srikar Bharat for a golden duck.

Pyla Avinash scored a 37-ball 44 but that was not enough as seven players could only manage single-digit scores.

In another Group A match, young Assam fast bowler Sadek Hussain returned a four-wicket haul on way to defeating Kerala by five wickets, while Chhattisgarh beat Railways by five wickets and five balls to spare.

Brief scores: Vidarbha 154/8 in 20 overs (Aman Mokhade 50, Akshay Wadkar 41; Satyanarayana Raju 4/26) beat Andhra 135/9 in 20 overs (Pyla Avinash 44; Yash Thakur 4/22) by 19 runs.

Kerala 101 in 19.4 overs (Sadek Hussain 4/19, Abdul Ajij Kuraishi 2/16, Avinov Choudhury 2/15) lost to Assam 105/5 in 18.5 overs (Pradyun Saikia 41 not out; KM Asif 2/22) by 5 wickets.

Odisha 167/7 in 20 overs (Sandeep Pattnaik 31, Sambit Baral 28, Aashirwad Swain 28; Suryansh Shedge 3/46) lost to Mumbai 168/1 in 16 overs (Ajinkya Rahane not out 95) by 9 wickets.

Railways 170 all out in 2 overs (Suraj Ahuja 47, Navneet Virk 30) lost to Chhattisgarh 171/5 in 19.1 overs (Amandeep Khare not out 78, Snajeet Desai 36) by 5 wickets. PTI AM KHS AH PDS PDS