BENGALURU: Riding on a more watchful approach from Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, East Zone used his 40 as the perfect launchpad to chase down the target of 159 with four wickets to spare on a sun-kissed Day Three of the Duleep Trophy semifinal at BCCI-CoE Ground 1 on Tuesday.
The southpaw, coming off an aggressive 92, shelved his usual attacking instincts but tore into a particular Yash Thakur. Thakur did have the final laugh as he removed him but the 15-year-old had already smuggled 18 runs via boundaries (three fours and a six).
That partnership of 61 between Sooryavanshi and Abhimanyu Easwaran helped them on their way to a first Duleep final in almost 14 years. There were some hiccups in the end as the spin of Harsh Dubey began to cause some problems. However, captain Ishan Kishan iced the chase without issues.
While Kishan & Co were celebrating in Ground-1, South Zone and North Zone were still involved in a fight but the former had the upper hand when stumps were drawn. North Zone, who have to win the game if they want to progress to the final in Chennai as South Zone took the first innings lead, began their third innings with an arrears of 117. Most of the North Zone batters got off to starts but in their desire to up the ante kept losing wickets at regular intervals.
On 256/7 with a lead of only 139 on what still looks like a good wicket for batting, South are the favourites. They needed the likes of Sanat Sangwan, Ayush Doseja and Ayush Badoni to make a big one but the trio were dismissed within quick succession in the afternoon.
Brief scores: Central Zone 266 & 158 in 50.2 ovs (Mokhade 41, Arshad 25, Mukesh 4/44, Shami 3/56) lost to East Zone 266 & 162/6 in 39.3 ovs (Sooryavanshi 40, Kishan 39, Dubey 4/53); North Zone 195 & 256/7 in 66 ovs (Sangwan 76, Doseja 52, Badoni 31, Kamboj batting 29, Nidheesh 2/47, Saiteja 2/34, Shreyas 2/77) vs South Zone 312 in 100.3 ovs (Tilak 116 n.o, Brar 4/88)