KOCHI: After three wins on the bounce, Kerala were stopped in their tracks by Andhra who secured a comfortable six-wicket win in their Elite Group E encounter of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy T20 tournament at the Sharad Pawar Cricket Academy BKC ground in Mumbai on Sunday.
Having beaten the likes of Delhi and Mumbai, it was Kerala who went into the game as favourites against Andhra who had lost all three of their previous games. In the end, Andhra managed to pick up their first points of the campaign while denting Kerala's bid to qualify from the group.
Kerala were playing at a different venue for the first time as all their previous three games were played at the Wankhede Stadium. After winning the toss, Andhra skipper Ambati Rayudu posed a new challenge for Kerala by asking them to bat first.
In all the previous three games, Kerala had batted second and successfully chased down targets of 138 (against Puducherry), 196 (against Mumbai) and 212 (against Delhi). This was the first time the Sanju Samson led team were batting first in this edition of the tournament and they struggled to replicate the scoring prowess from the previous games.
The openers Mohammed Azharuddeen (12) and Robin Uthappa (8) couldn't give them a start while Sanju departed after making just seven from fourteen balls. While Sanju struck 32 in their opening game against Puducherry, the swashbuckling batsman has not been at his best in the tournament so far. While Kerala have managed to win three on the bounce under his stewardship, his form with the bat would be crucial if they have to qualify from the group. Up until now, other batsmen have stepped up and taken up responsibility but Kerala would be hoping to see more from their best batsman.
The Andhra bowlers kept a check on the scoring and also found crucial breakthroughs as they managed to dismiss the dangerous Vishnu Vinod for just four to leave Kerala stuttering at 38/4 in the tenth over.
Kerala had their experienced campaigners Sachin Baby (51 not out) and Jalaj Saxena (27 not out) to thank as they managed to cross the hundred-run mark and post 112 for 4. Manish Golamaru was the pick of the bowlers for Andhra with two wickets with his victims being Sanju and Vishnu.
Andhra strolled to victory as they made short work of the chase with opener Ashwin Hebbar giving them the perfect start by scoring 48 from 46 balls. The job was finished off by Andhra skipper Rayudu who struck an unbeaten 38 to help his side reach the target in 17.1 overs. Jalaj's brilliant spell of 2 for 9 was not enough as Kerala were thoroughly outplayed by Andhra.
Kerala will now take on Haryana while Andhra take on Mumbai in the next round of fixtures.
Brief scores: Kerala 112/4 in 20 ovs (Baby 51 no, Jalaj 27 no, Manish 2/19) lost to Andhra 113/4 in 17.1 ovs (Hebbar 48, Rayudu 38 no, Jalaj 2/9)