Mundhe scripts Maharashtra triumph over Mumbai in Vijay Hazare Q/F

NEW DELHI: Maharashtra allrounder Shrikant Mundhe got to bowl only four overs against Mumbai in the quarterfinals of the Vijay Hazare Trophy at the Palam cricket ground on Wednesday. But when the team backed him to open the innings, he responded with a match-winning knock. Maharashtra lost Ruturaj Dasharath early while chasing Mumbai’s target of 223. But Mundhe took charge of the proceedings and played some exquisite shots on way to his 70.His knock laid the foundation for his team and enabled Maharashtra to trump their arch-rivals by seven wickets.
Two square-cuts that flew from Mundhe’s bat off Dhawal Kulkarni gave enough indication that he was in the mood to play a special knock for his team.
It began quite well for Maharashtra as Pradeep Dadhe (3/57) picked two early Mumbai wickets in the form of Prithvi Shaw and Siddhesh Lad and reduced them to25for two. Mumbai captain Adtiya Tare and Shreyas Iyer tried to resurrect the innings, but Mumbai kept losing wickets at regular intervals and eventually few short by at least 40 to 50 runs of a score that could have posed some challenge. It was Suryakumar Yadav’s 69 that saved Mumbai’s blushes. But Maharashtra bowlers kept making inroads to restrict Mumbai to 222 for eight.
The only hiccup for Maharashtra came when they lost two quick wickets on the score of 135. Mundhe was first run out after a horrible mix-up with captain Rahul Tripathi and in the next over Tripathi got out on 49. With two new batsmen at the crease, it looked like anyone’s game.
But Ankit Bawane and Naushad Shaikh ensured that Maharashtra sealed the issue without much of a problem. Earlier, Mumbai won the toss and elected to bat on a fresh Palam wicket, which had a bit of carry for the fast bowlers. Dadhe bowled a few good in-swingers in his first spell to bother Shaw, who started well with two superb hits to the fence.
Brief scores: Mumbai 222/9 (Suryakumar Yadav 69; Prashant Kore 2/34, Pradeep Dadhe 3/57) lost to Maharashtra 224/3 in 46.5 overs (Shrikant Mundhe 70, N Sheikh 51 no., R Tripathi 49).