In a nail-biting finish, Punjab defeated Assam by 1 run in a Group A clash on day four of the 2015 Vijay Hazare Trophy. After being sent in by Assam, Punjab capitalised on the opportunity, as their openers Jiwanjot Singh and Pragat Singh gave them a solid start and put up 67 runs for the first wicket in 16 overs.
But the star of the day was Mandeep Singh, who walked in at first-down and smashed 117 off 97 with 12 fours and 3 sixes. Yuvraj Singh and Gurkeerat Mann also chipped in with 36 and 62 that included seven sixes between them.
In reply, Sarupam Purkayastha led the Assam chase with a magnificent 125 from just 116 balls, a knock that included 18 fours and 1 six. Amit Verma and Gokul Sharma also made valuable contributions with their 71 and 60, but it was Punjab who held their nerves, as Barinder Singh Sran ran Amit Sinha out on the last ball of the match, with Assam still needing a run to draw level with Punjab.
Brief Scores: Punjab 327/8 (Mandeep 117*, Amit Verma 2/61) beat Assam (toss) 326/8 (Purkayastha 125, Kaul 3/74) by 1 run.
In another Group A clash, Tamil Nadu easily outplayed Services by seven wickets as they reached the target of 193 with more than 10 overs to spare, after restricting Services to 192/8 in their 50 overs.
Abhinav Mukund top-scored for Tamil Nadu with 85, while Baba Aparajith remained unbeaten on 66. M Mohammed picked up 5 wickets for Tamil Nadu while Diwesh Pathania picked up three for Services.
Brief Scores: Services 192/8 (Yashpal Singh 58, Mohammed 5/50) lost to Tamil Nadu (toss) 193/3 (Mukund 85, Pathania 3/41) by seven wickets.
Moving over to Group B, Karnataka beat Gujarat by 18 runs (VJD Method – V Jayadevan Method) when they restricted Gujarat to 189/8 in their allotted 44 overs. Earlier Karnataka made 233/8 in the 1st innings with Manish Pandey playing an unbeaten knock of 94.
Rain played spoilsport though, and Gujarat were asked to make 204 from 44 overs according to the VJD Method. Gujarat though never looked in the hunt, as R Vinay Kumar, Jagdeesha Suchith and Shreyas Gopal picked up two wickets each to stop Gujarat at 189/8.
Brief Scores: Karnataka 233/8 (Manish Pandey 94*, Mehul Patel 2/24) beat Gujarat (toss) 189/8 (Panchal 52, Suchith 2/25) by 18 runs. (VJD Method)
In Group C, Maharashtra ousted Andhra by 47 runs after bowling them out for 194 in reply to their total of 241/8. Maharashtra benefitted from its two centurions for the day, AR Bawane and Kedar Jadhav, who made 100 and 101 to guide their team to a respectable total.
Andhra floundered in their reply, as they kept losing wickets at regular intervals, and were bowled out for 194 in 42.5 overs. SM Kazi picked 4/36 for Maharashtra.
Brief Scores: Maharashtra (toss) 241/8 (Jadhav 101, Stephen 3/54) beat Andhra 194 (Koripalli 74, Kazi 4/36) by 47 runs.
Tripura suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of Delhi by 8 wickets, after they were bowled out for a paltry score of 100 in their Group C clash today. Pawan Suyal picked 3/14 for Delhi while Navdeep Saini, Manan Sharma and Pawan Negi picked up 2 a piece.
In reply, Nitish Rana smashed 67 off 48 with 10 fours and 3 sixes a Delhi reached their taget of 101 in just 16 overs.
Brief Scores: Tripura 100 (Parvinder Singh 20, Suyal 3/14) lost to Delhi (toss) 101/2 (Rana 67, Datta 2/21) by 8 wickets.
In Group D, Himachal Pradesh registered an emphatic victory over Saurashtra by seven wickets, as they bowled them out for 195 before reaching their target in 43.2 overs.
Cheteshwar Pujara top-scored with 74 for Saurashtra but he was the only one to put up resistance against the Himachal bowlers as Rishi Dhawan and Ronit More picked up 3 wickets each. Himachal cruised to victory with only three wickets down, with AK Bains scoring 76.
Brief Scores: Saurashtra (toss) 195 (Pujara 73, More 3/44) lost to Himachal 197/3 (Bains 76 Makwana 2/26) by three wickets.
The results from the other games on day 4 of the Vijay Hazare Trophy are as follows:
Baroda (toss) 225 (Waghmode 111, Ankit Yadav 4/44) beat Odisha 169 (Behera 67, Munaf 2/31) by 56 runs.
Rajasthan 250/8 (Menaria 55, Ravi Kiran 4/57) beat Hyderabad (toss) 148 (Vihari 39, TM Ul Haq 4/44) by 102 runs.
Uttar Pradesh 211 (Akshdeep 67, Datey 2/32) lost to Madhya Pradesh (toss) 212/2 (Naman Ojha 114, Bhuvneshwar Kumar 1/44) by 8 wickets.
Jammu & Kashmir 130 (Bandeep Singh 31, Fabid Ahmed 3/24) lost to Kerala (toss) 134/3 (Surendran 85*, Rasool 3/33) by 7 wickets.
Haryana (toss) 133 (Dagar 38, Rahul Shukla 3/33) lost to Jharkhand 134/1 (Jaggi 62, HV Patel 1/38) by 9 wickets.
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