Mumbai, Mar 24: Hosts Mumbai, cheered on by the local crowd at the Brabourne Stadium, beat Tamil Nadu by 31 runs to enter the Syed Mushtaq Ali semi-final.
Opting to bat first, Mumbai got off to a blistering start with Wasim Jaffer slamming 16 of the 17 runs that the openers scored off the first over by Rahil Shah. And although Ajinkya Rahane was run out in the second over, Abhishek Nayar who replaced him at the crease, attacked the TN bowlers from the word go, bringing up the home team’s 50 off 21 balls. The duo added 86 runs for the second wicket until Wasim Jaffer was sent back by S Suresh Kumar. The veteran opener scored a whirlwind 51 off 31 balls, with a six and seven boundaries, including his signature leg-glance. Nayar, too, was on song at the other end, matching the opener run-for-a-run as the two reached their half-centuries.
Rohit Sharma, who replaced Jaffer at the crease, started off by sending the ball to the fence but was sent back for seven by C Ganapathy. In the following over, Nayar was stumped off Suresh Kumar for 79. His 41-ball blitzkrieg comprised of eight boundaries and four hits over the ropes. After the departure of Nayar in the fourteenth over, Mumbai lost five more wickets in the space of 38 deliveries while adding another 50 runs to reach 193.
Balaji claimed Ankit Chavan, and later Iqbal Abdulla and Ajit Agarkar in the last over, and R Ashiwn dismissed Aditya Tare for 17; Surya Kumar Yadav was run out for 14.
Chasing a competitive total, opener Abhinav Mukund, who looked in good nick, was run out at the non-striker’s end looking for a non-existent single after Anirudh Srikanth had hit the ball straight to the fielder. The southpaw had scored 34 runs in the 62-run opening partnership. His opening partner soon returned for 32 while Dinesh Karthik was caught at mid-off by Nayar off Javed Khan in the next over. After dismissing Srikanth, Ankit Chavan had S Badrinath stumped in his next over. However, in his following over, Wasim Jaffer dropped Suresh Kumar on nine in the covers, depriving the bowler of a third scalp in his third consecutive over. Chavan was then hit for 17 runs in his last over, 16 off which came off Suresh’s bat. Suresh was eventually castled by Dhawal Kulkarni for 49 (26).
Iqbal Abdulla, who claimed KB Arun Karthik, also removed Ashwin but Ganpathy, who was yet to open his account, was dropped by Agarkar off the left-arm spinner’s bowling.
Ajinkya Rahane took a good catch at the boundary to send back the Tamil Nadu skipper for naught. An over later, Kulkarni rattled R Jesuraj’s stumps for zero and in the same over removed Ganpathy to bowl out TN for 162 in 18.5 overs.
Brief scores: Mumbai 193/9 in 20 overs ( A Nayar 79, W Jaffer 51, L Balaji 3/33) beat Tamil Nadu 162 all out in 18.5 overs (S Suresh Kumar 49, D Kulkarni 3/32, I Abdullah 2/24, A Chavan 2/35, J Khan 2/39) by 31 runs
