Ranji Trophy: Unadkat shines in Saurashtra’s win

Saurashtra had 200 to chase down and was on the mat at 113/6. But Aarpit Vasavada and Prerak Mankad got together and they took the bull by the horns, adding 87 to take Saurashtra over the line by four wickets.

Vasavada made 48 not out, Mankad finished with an unbeaten 36. The outright win strengthens its position as far as quarter-finals qualification goes. In six games, it has 25 points with three wins. Meanwhile, in Surat in a Group A game, Gujarat needs 105 more to win against Vidarbha. At 104/6, Vidarbha was down in the dumps, leading by just 36. Then, it was lifted by a seventh-wicket partnership of 82 between Akshay Wadkar and Aditya Sarvate to help swell its lead. Wadkar top scored with 87.

At close of play, Gujarat was tottering at 74/4 with Aditya Thakare picking up all four wickets for the defending champion. At Ongole in another Group A clash, Andhra beat Kerala by seven wickets while Rajasthan beat Hyderabad by nine wickets in another Group A clash. At Indore, Uttar Pradesh won by seven wickets against Madhya Pradesh in Group B.

Meanwhile, only 9.3 overs of play was possible in Bengal and Delhi’s Day 3 Group A match where Delhi still trails Bengal by 101 runs with three wickets in hand. For the home team, Mukesh Kumar took three wickets and Shahbaz Ahmed snared two to dent Delhi’s charge. In Delhi, Karnataka leads Railways by 17 runs after it was 199/6 at stumps on Day 3 in reply to Railways’ 182.

Brief scores: Baroda 154 & 187 lost to Saurashtra 142 & 200/6 in 59.3 overs (H Desai 49, A Vasavada 48*); Kerala 162 & 135 lost to Andhra 255 & 43/3 in 15.1 overs; Madhya Pradesh 230 & 160 lost to Uttar Pradesh 216 & 178/3 in 56.4 overs (A Shaukat 54, A Juyal 74*, M Saif 40*); Bengal 318 vs Delhi 217/7 in 75 overs