Bengaluru, Jan 15 (PTI) The unflappable Aman Mokhade struck his fifth hundred of this season’s Vijay Hazare Trophy, powering Vidarbha to a smooth six-wicket victory over defending champions Karnataka and to the tournament’s final here on Thursday.
Mokhade (131, 122 balls) and R Samarth (76 not out, 69b) were the lead actors in Vidarbha’s 284 for four in reply to Karnataka’s 280 all out, which was built around fifties from Karun Nair and KL Shrijith.
Pacer Darshan Nalkande (5/48) helped Vidarbha stymie Karnataka’s progress in the backend, and they will face the winner of the second semifinal between Punjab and Saurashtra in the title round on Sunday. Vidarbha had never beaten Karnataka in the country’s premier 50-over domestic competition and they chose the perfect occasion to snap that jinx, and Mokhade played an important role in it with a stoic knock.
After losing his opening partner Atharva Taide early in the chase, Mokhade braved confident Karnataka bowlers, a tight situation and cramps towards the end of his innings to bring up a hundred in 101 balls.
He was involved in two significant partnerships — a 99-run second wicket alliance with impressive Dhruv Shorey (47) and then milked 147 runs for the third wicket with Samarth, who turned it on his old team with an array of sparkling shots.
That pacer Vysakh Vijaykumar had to go out of the field due to concussion after the 20th over hindered the Karnataka bowling in the middle overs.
Vysakh had pinged on his helmet in the last over of Karnataka’s innings by pacer Yash Thakur, as Manvanth Kumar came in as concussion substitute.
Mokhade reached his hundred with a flicked four off pacer Vidyadhar Patil and celebrated the moment with gusto.
The 24-year-old right-hander eventually played a tired-looking swipe off Patil to be caught by Devdutt Padikkal inside the circle.
But by then he had put the match well beyond Karnataka’s grasp.
Earlier, Karnataka produced a batting effort of many highs and lows to reach a total that was just enough competitive.
Their innings started on a lowkey note, with the first 10 overs producing just 33 runs. In that phase, Karnataka also lost both their openers Mayank Agarwal and Devdutt Padikkal.
Agarwal was trapped in front of the wicket by pacer Nachiket Bhute, while Devdutt was done in by a gem by Yash Thakur.
The ball came into the left-hander initially before moving away late, and all Devdutt could manage was an edge to wicketkeeper Rohit Binkar.
However, a period of stability followed as Karun and Dhruv Prabhakar, who came in for R Smaran, who suffered a shoulder niggle, added 54 runs for the third wicket.
Prabhakar looked in fine touch but a short-pitched ball from Darshan Nalkande hurried him into a pull, which was grabbed at square leg by Shorey.
Karun and KL Shrijith then came up with a better partnership of 113 runs for the fourth wicket. Karun was struggling for his timing but hung in there to support his more fluent younger partner.
Karun gave glimpses of his shot-making abilities when he ramped Thakur for a four, and the right-hander had a slice of fortune too when Yash Rathod caught him outside the boundary line off Bhute.
The 34-year-old brought his fifty in 73 balls and that looked to ease him a bit.
Both Karun and Shrijith, who reached fifty in 54 balls, upped the pace from that point, as the 31st over produced 15 runs and 11 runs came in from 33rd over, as a total of 31 runs flowed in just three overs.
But Vidarbha got the break just in time, as Nalkande dismissed Karun and Shrijith fell six runs later with Karnataka slipping to 193 for five.
Karnataka got a mini boost through Shreyas Gopal (36) and Abhinav Manohar (26) who added 55 runs for the sixth wicket.
But the home side lost a flurry of wickets in the business end, losing momentum and a few additional runs. PTI UNG BS BS
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