KL Rahul slammed a hurricane 62 off 37 balls to guide Karnataka to an 83-run victory over Kerala in their South Zone T20 cricket tournament for the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy on Monday.
Batting first, Karnataka amassed 185 for five in 20 overs with one-drop Rahul (62, 5x4, 2x6) top scoring and opener Manish Pandey notching up 50 off 42 balls. Rahul holed out Prashanth Parameswaran to RV Gomez and Pandey was unfortunately run out after he cracked four sparkling fours.
Kerala bowlers did not trouble Karnataka batsmen much as three of their batsmen were run out. Parameswaran and P Prashanth picked up one wicket each. In reply, Kerala could manage only 102 for nine. Local lad and medium pacer Santhebennur Lokesh Akshay (2 for 18) and AA Verma (2 for 16) were the pick of Karnataka bowlers. For Kerela, Robert Fernandez top-scored with 21.
Tamil Nadu pulled off an easy eight-wicket win over Goa. The Goans managed 122 for 7 in 20 overs with RU Shukla (39) being the highest scorer. Lakshmipathy Balaji, Sunil Sam and right-arm offbreak S Suresh Kumar scalped two wickets each.
Tamil Nadu overhauled the target in 16.5 overs with an unbeaten partnership of 78 for the third wicket between Abhinav Mukund (49, 31b) and S Badrinath (31, 30b).
Meanwhile, Andhra coasted to a 5-wicket win over Hyderabad. Andhra knocked off the target (163 for five) with K S Bharat and DB Prashanth scoring 36 each.
Brief scores: Hyderabad 161-5 in 20 overs (T Suman 85, PA Reddy 44, T Atchuta Rao 4-32) lost to Andhra 163-5 in 20 overs (K Bharat 36, D Prasanth 36, A Pradeep 30). Points: Andhra 4, Hyderabad 0. Karnataka 185-5 in 20 overs (K Rahul 62, Manish Pandey 50, M Agarwal 33) bt Kerala 102-9 in 20 overs (R Fernandez 21, Amit Verma 2-16, S Akshay 2-18). Points: Karnataka 4, Kerala 0. Goa 122-7 in 20 overs (Ravikant Shukla 39, S Kamat 24, S Sam 2-14, S Kumar 2-19, L Balaji 2-33) lost to Tamil Nadu 126-2 in 17.2 overs (Abhinav Mukund 49 no, S Badrinath 31 no). Points: Tamil Nadu 4, Goa 0.