Maharashtra defeated Assam by 12 runs in the semi-finals of the Vijay Hazare Trophy played in Ahmedabad. With this win, Maharashtra entered the final. He will face Saurashtra in the title fight. Saurashtra defeated Karnataka in another semi-final to book the final ticket. Captain Rituraj Gaikwad played an important role in Maharashtra’s victory. He played a brilliant innings of 168 runs. Apart from him, Ankit Bawne also scored a century. He came out after scoring 110 runs. Rajvardhan Hengargekar completed the right-hand spin while bowling later. He took four wickets. The final of the Vijay Hazare Trophy will be played on December 2.
In this semi-final match, Assam fielded after winning the toss. The start of the Maharashtra side, who came out to bat, was not a good one, their first wicket falling by 27 runs. Rahul Tripathi, who came on to start the innings, came out after scoring 3 runs. Satyajit Bachhav played a 41-run innings. After this Rituraj took the reins of the team along with Ankit Bawne. Both completed their respective centuries batting excellently. Captain Rituraj played an innings of 168 runs off 126 balls, which included 18 fours and 6 sixes. While Ankit scored 110 runs with 10 fours and 2 sixes. In this way, Maharashtra scored a grand score of 350 runs for 7 wickets. Mukhtar Hussain took the maximum of three wickets for Assam.
The start of the Assam team, which went out to meet the target of 351 runs for victory, was very bad. The first wicket fell when the team’s score was just 9 runs. Rahul Hazarika, who came on to start the innings, came out after scoring 5 runs. After this, Captain Kunal Saikia also scored 10. In the middle order, Rishav Das tried to give the team stability by scoring 51 runs, but batsman Riyan Parag was sacked after scoring 15 runs. Following this, Sibsankar Roy and Swaroopam Purkayastha were seen taking the match from him. While Manoj Ingale made Roy run, Hengargekar made Purkayastha his victim. Sibsankar scored 78 and Swaroopam scored 95 runs. After the dismissal of these two, the Assam team fell 12 runs away from victory. In the lower order, Avinoy Chaudhary and Mukhtar Hussain gave their all to win the team, but they failed to do so. The Assam team were able to score 338 runs for 8 wickets in 50 overs. Hengargekar took 4 wickets as he bowled brilliantly.