da bet vitoria： With the top order in crackling form, South Zoneproceeded to the semifinals of the Deodhar TrophyTournament with an easy seven wicket win over EastZone at the Green Park stadium in Kanpur onFriday
da apostaganha： Natarajan Sriram15-Dec-2000With the top order in crackling form, South Zoneproceeded to the semifinals of the Deodhar TrophyTournament with an easy seven wicket win over EastZone at the Green Park stadium in Kanpur onFriday. South are now slated to take on North Zonein the semifinals at the same venue on Sunday.It is never an easy task to chase a target of 274but the South Zone openers J Arun Kumar (89) andAS Pathak (66) took the game away from theiropponents by authouring a 160-run partnershipwhich came in 30 overs. It was Debang Gandhi,coming on to bowl very late in the innings, whomade the first inroads into the South Zone lineup, with two quick wickets. Arun Kumar was thefirst to be dismissed caught by Sanjay Raul. Eightballs later, Pathak also departed, caught by ShivSundar Das.Arun Kumar, during his 111-minute stay, faced 95balls during which he essayed eight boundarieswhile managing to clear it twice. On the otherhand, Pathak was in the middle for close to twohours and needed 93 balls for his 66. He found thesignboards on seven occasions. Then VVS Laxman (32not out) and S Sharath (11) came together to takethe score to 190. Sharath after a brief stayreturned to the pavilion, caught behind by Dhonioff Jai Chandra.South Zone skipper Robin Singh entered at thisstage. With another 88 runs to be scored in 13.3overs, Robin Singh hammered an unbeaten 63 off 52balls to take South Zone home.Earlier opting to bat, East Zone’s inningsrevolved around a fine 108 by Test discard DebangGandhi. Coming in at the fall of opener NikhilHaldipur (16), Gandhi forged a 79-run third wicketstand in 12.2 overs with RR Parida (26). Thedeparture of Parida saw Rohan Gavaskar (58) joinGandhi and the two took the score to 233. With a122-run fourth wicket partnership which came offonly 19.3 overs, the two ensured that East Zonewould pile up a fighting total. Gandhi, who faced131 balls and hit 14 of them to the ropes was thefourth batsman to be dismissed. East Zone’s totalof 273 for seven in 50 overs was inflated by 40extras.
