Duleep Trophy: Saurabh Kumar’s eight-for crush East Zone by 170 runs, North destroy North East

With an easy 170-run victory over East Zone here on Saturday, Central Zone advanced to the Duleep Trophy semifinals. This was made possible by Saurabh Kumar’s outstanding eight-wicket haul.

East Zone, starting with a score of 69 for 6, never really put up much of a fight and were bowled out for 129 in their second innings.

On July 5, Central will play West Zone in their semifinal encounter at the Alur grounds. At the Chinnaswamy Stadium, North Zone and South Zone will square off in the second semifinal.

The only chance East had to at least keep Central close was Riyan Parag’s presence. But it was quickly put an end when Saurabh, a left-arm spinner, caught the Assamese kid in front of the wicket.

Soon after, Saurabh added the dismissals of Akash Deep, Shahbaz Nadeem, and Ishan Porel to his collection, finishing with an amazing 8 for 64. With 11 wickets in the game, Saurabh had a strong performance.

The fall was somewhat astonishing because there was nothing particularly worrisome in the pitch to support it. In fact, East’s first innings ended with them being bowled out for 122.

Duleep Trophy: North destroy North East by massive 511

On the fourth morning in Bengaluru, North Zone thrashed North East Zone by 511 runs to complete the requirements for their march into the semi-final. In an effort to reach the final, North will now compete against South Zone starting on July 5 at the same location.

North East lost 7 for 53 after beginning the day with 58 for 3 thanks to a middle-order collapse designed by Pulkit Narang. He used his offspin to take four of the wickets.

The 57-run fourth-wicket stand between Palzor Tamang and Nilesh Lamichaney was the sole bright point for North East. The stand was broken by all-rounder Nishant Sindhu’s dismissal of Lamichaney, which started North East’s decline from 101 for 3. Following Tamang, who had the highest score of 40, Narang took his first wicket in the second innings.

While Harshit Rana scored an unbeaten 122 and concluded the game with two wickets, Sindhu, who had hit 150 before picking up two wickets on Saturday, and Harshrang, who finished with seven wickets, had memorable games as well.

Also read: Shaheen Afridi breaks world record for taking most wickets in 1st over of a T20 innings

Thank you for reading.