TN Thrash Tripura by 8 Wickets

Thiruvananthapuram, Nov 15 (PTI) Tamil Nadu thrashed Tripura by eight wickets in a Group 'B' match of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy T20 cricket tournament here on Friday.

Electing to bat, Tripura recovered from a nightmarish 9 for 7 in 5.1 overs to make 79 for 8 in the allotted 20 overs, which Tamil Nadu overhauled in 12.1 overs, riding on a breezy knock of 46 (32 balls, 4 fours, 2 sixes) by M S Washington Sundar.

Left-arm spinner R Sai Kishore, opening the attack, was the best bowler with figures of 4 for 6 in 4 overs which included two maidens. His victims were opener Joydeep Banik, Pratyush Singh, Milind Kumar and Kaushal Acharjee. Barring Acharjee, the others made ducks.

Left-arm seamer T Natarajan scalped three wickets, giving away only 4 runs in his four overs.

Five Tripura batsmen failed to open their account as the team appeared to be in danger of being bowled out for the lowest ever T20 score of 21 (by Turkey against Czech Republic in August this year).

Some dogged batting and big hitting by Saurabh Sankar Das (44, 50 balls, 2 fours, 3 sixes) and Neelambuj Vats (28 not out, 47 balls, 1 four, 1 six) ensured that Tripura played out the quota of overs and reached 79.

Washington Sundar pushed up to open flayed four boundaries and hoisted two big sixes, before being caught by keeper Joydeep Banik off Abhijit Chakraborty for 46. B Aparajith (33 not out) saw the team home along with M Shahrukh Khan (0 not out).

In other games, Rajasthan cruised to a seven-wicket win over Kerala thanks to Rajesh Bishnoi's unbeaten 76 and Uttar Pradesh beat Manipur by a similar margin.

The UP-Manipur match saw India medium-pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar return after being out of action since the tour of West Indies where he featured in the T20s.

He has been recovering from a hamstring injury and a side strain and assessed himself for a comeback when he participated in a "skill session" during Indian team's practice ahead of the first Test against Bangladesh in Indore.

Tamil Nadu has joined Vidarbha at the top with 16 points from five matches.

Brief scores: Kerala 164 for 6 in 20 overs (Sanju Samson 53, Sachin Baby 47, Vishnu Vinod 36, Khaleel Ahmed 2/28, Deepak Chahar 2/29) lost to Rajasthan 167 for 3 in 17 overs (Rajesh Bishnoi 76 not out, Arjit Gupta 44, Manender Singh 35). Rajasthan: 4 points, Kerala: 0.

Manipur 89 for 7 in 20 overs (Rex Singh 30, Moshin Khan 2/9, Ankjit Rajpoot 2/14) lost to Uttar Pradesh 93 for 3 in 12.4 overs (Rinku Singh 39 not out). UP: 4 points, Manipur: 0.

Tripura 79 for 8 in 20 overs (Saurabh Sankar Das 44, Neelambuj Vats 28 not out, R Sai Kishore 4/6, T Natarajan 3/4) lost to Tamil Nadu 80 for 2 in 12.1 overs (M S Washington Sundar 46, B Aparajith 33 not out). TN: 4 points, Tripura: 0.

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