Chhattisgarh, Tamil Nadu make semis; Mumbai out

Bengaluru, Oct. 21: Rain ended Mumbai’s Vijay Hazare Trophy campaign here on Monday as Chhattisgarh made it to the semi-finals on the basis of more wins against their quarterfinal opponents in the league phase.

Tamil Nadu also reached the semi-finals on the basis of more wins than Punjab in the league stage after their quarter-final game was cut short by rain. Tamil Nadu had won nine out of nine matches in Group C, while Chhattisgarh emerged victorious in five out of eight games in Group A.

Mumbai won four. While Tamil Nadu will take on Gujarat in the semifinals on Wednesday, hosts Karnataka will clash with Chhattisgarh on the same day. In pursuit of a revised target of 195 from 39 overs, Mumbai were cruising at 95 for no loss in 11.3 overs with young Yashasvi Jaiswal batting on 60 (38 balls, 5 fours, 5 sixes) and

Aditya Tare on 31. However, the skies opened up and the match was abandoned, ending Mumbai’s topsy-turvy campaign.

As per rules, Mumbai needed to bat a minimum of

20 overs to get a result in this game. But as the game was abandoned, Chhattisgarh qualified. Put into bat at the Alur cricket stadium III, Mumbai bowlers did well to restrict Chhattisgarh to 190 for six in 45.4 overs, when play was halted due to rain.

Experienced mediumpacer Dhawal Kulkarni sent Chhattisgarh opener Jiwanjyot Singh Chauhan

(0) back after he edged to keeper Tare. Shardul

Thakur got rid off Shashank Chandrakar to leave Chhattisgarh in trouble at 3 for 2. Ashutosh Pratap Singh (27), who came in at one drop, was unable to convert his start as Chhattisgarh slipped to

40 for 3. Skipper Harpreet Singh Bhatia (83) and Amandeep Khare (59 not out) led the recovery with a

135-run stand.

In the other last eight game, Punjab restricted Tamil Nadu to 174 for six in

39 overs when rain stopped play. Tamil Nadu had a shaky start after openers Murali Vijay (22) and Abhinav Mukund (17) failed to convert starts.