da heads bet： Making light of a difficult target, South Zone romped to an eightwicket victory over East Zone in the Deodhar Trophy match at theSardar Patel stadium in Ahmedabad on Tuesday
Partab Ramchand25-Jan-2000Making light of a difficult target, South Zone romped to an eightwicket victory over East Zone in the Deodhar Trophy match at theSardar Patel stadium in Ahmedabad on Tuesday. Chasing a challengingtotal of 275 for seven in 50 overs, South Zone, led by theirrepressible J Arun Kumar coasted to a win with 5.1 overs to spare.Shrugging off a six wicket defeat at the hands of West Zone in theiropening game on January 22, South Zone put up a commendable showagainst East Zone, who went down to their second successive loss. Thebatsmen in particular displayed very good form and no one playedbetter than the consistent Arun Kumar who notched up his secondsuccessive century in the competition. He had scored 121 against WestZone. Arun Kumar and S Mahesh set South Zone on the road to victorypretty early with a first wicket partnership of 126 runs off 23overs. The Tamil Nadu opening bowler, who loves to strike the ball,relished his new role and almost matched the in form Arun Kumar instrokes and run production. By the time Mahesh was out for 50 off 70balls with six fours and a six, South Zone were already on theirway. Arun Kumar and left hander S Sriram (39) then maintained thetempo with a second wicket partnership of 78 runs from 11.3 overs. Bythe time Sriram left in the 35th over, South Zone had virtually madesure of a facile victory. By this time, Arun Kumar had got to hiscentury and the Karnataka opening batsman just carried on in thecompany of his captain Sridharan Sarath, who at the end was not outwith 20. But the cynosure was Arun Kumar who remained unbeaten with148. So commanding was his batsmanship that he faced just 150 ballsand hit 16 fours and three sixes. The unbroken third wicket standbetween Arun Kumar and Sarath added 72 runs off 10.2 overs to steerSouth Zone home quite comfortably.The morning belonged to East Zone and to Rashmi Ranjan Parida inparticular. The 25-year-old Orissa right hander struck an unbeaten 106off 112 balls with 13 fours as East Zone made runs confidently. Hisinnings was important as it also rescued East Zone from a hesitantstart. Nikhil Haldipur was dismissed by Kumaran for a duck and thenRohan Gavaskar (26) fell at 66 in the 14th over. But Parida and openerSS Das then initiated a recovery process by adding 69 runs for thethird wicket off 14.3 overs. Das then fell for 52 off 77 balls,inclusive of four hits to the ropes. The recovery process wascontinued by Parida and Saba Karim who put on 44 runs for the fourthwicket off 7.4 overs. But off spinner Aashish Kapoor who had dismissedDas, then triggered off a mini collapse by taking the wickets of SSRaul (1) and Rajiv Kumar with successive deliveries. But Laxmi RatanShukla and Parida then revived the innings with a seventh wicketpartnership of 75 runs off 10.5 overs before the former was out for avaluable 37. Shukla faced 40 balls and hit four fours and asix. Parida reached his hundred shortly afterwards and East Zone wereable to post what seemed to be a challenging total, despite theefforts of Kapoor, who finished with three for 53 off ten overs. Butthen they reckoned without Arun Kumar.